TIDBITS 04/04/10

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We encourage you to forward this email to friends and colleagues. =========================================== Peleus and Dorylas

King Peleus ... father to be of Achilles of the vulnerable heel ... marries the sea nymph Thetis and neglects to invite the evil goddess of Discord, Eris. Crowds of Centaurs attend among them--I am presuming--the Centaur Dorylas. Eris makes trouble ... creates jealousies. And now things get a tad muddled ... I am having great difficulties determining correct sequential events. However at one point or another in time Peleus and Dorylas enter into battle and Peleus hurls an arrow at Dorylas which imbeds intself into the Centaur's forehead pinning his hand--which he held up to protect himself--to the aforementioned brow. And that ... thanks be to the fates ... is all you need to know. A quick digression. I wouldn't mind getting the straight story if one of you have it.

And so we come by way of arcane meanderings to a Chalcedony Intaglio ... a gold and enamel pendant of early 19th century origins ... depicting Peleus fleeing from Dorylas whom he has wounded in the front and about whom you now have a rather inchoate, incomplete, and sparse background. We here at Tyler-Adam Corp aim at confusion if nothing else. I do hope we're doing a good job. Please let me know.

This Chaldedony cameo was once part of a collection of carved gems owned by Prince Stanislas Poniatowski who was nephew to King Stanislas Augustus of Poland. Poniatowski who--let's call him Poni for short--upon his death had a collection of 2601 gems. Ah ... the whims of the idle rich. Why don't I have 2601 carved gems signed by varied Gerco-Roman engravers? Could it be because I ain't no prince?

All that aside ... this collection ... which falls under category of Catalogue of the Very Celebrated Collection of Antique Gems of Prince Poniatowski Deceased ... contains the Intaglio of which I speak ... and of which I have an image. It is framed within a black enamel and gold border of openwork palmette and lotus flower design. It measures

46 x 28mm and it bears the fake signature: KP(omega)MOU. Why would someone not want the world to know he created this piece? Ah man ... thou art indeed a puzzlement.

And so I cry that old refrain: Wanna see?

For those of you who are new to this thing called Tidbits...may I direct you to my home page at

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where you will scroll down the left side menu till you get to the area that says Current Tidbits ... and you will see represented on our pages an Intaglio created by an unknown. And there ya have it. That's it for this week folks. Catch you all next week. Benjamin Mark