Pietre dure

Related arts and terms

Pietredure is an Italian plural meaning "hard rocks" or hardstones; the singular pietra dura is also encountered in Italian. In Italian, but not in English, the term embraces all gem engraving and hardstone carving, which is the artistic carving of three-dimensional objects in semi-precious stone, normally from a single piece, for example in Chinese jade. The traditional convention in English has been to use the singular pietra dura just to denote multi-colored inlay work. However, in recent years there has been a trend to use "pietre dure" as a term for the same thing, but not for all of the techniques it covers, in Italian. But the title of a 2008 exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Art of the Royal Court: Treasures in Pietre Dure from the Palaces of Europe, used the full Italian sense of the term, probably because they thought that it had greater brand recognition. The material on the website speaks of objects such as a vase in lapis lazuli as being examples of "hardstone carving (pietre dure)". The Victoria & Albert Museum in London uses both versions on its website, but uses "pietra dura" ("A method of inlaying coloured marbles or semi-precious stones into a stone base, often in geometric or flower patterns....") in its "Glossary", which was evidently not consulted by the author of another page, where the reader is told: "Pietre dure (from the Italian 'hard stone') is made from finely sliced coloured stones, precisely matched, to create a pictorial scene or regular design". The English term "Florentine mosaic" is sometimes also encountered, probably developed by the tourist industry. Giovanni Montelatici (1864–1930) was an Italian Florentine artist whose brilliant work has been distributed across the world by tourists and collectors.