Johann Lorenz Natter (1705-1763) German, circa 1740-1750

together with a modern 18 carat gold impression of the gem

William Ponsonby, 2nd Earl of Bessborough, Roehampton, circa 1740-1750;
George Spencer, 4th Duke of Marlborough, Blenheim Palace, circa 1760;
his sale, Christie's London, 28 June 1875;
David Bromilow;
and thence by inheritance to Mrs. Jary;
her sale, Christie's London, 26 June 1899, lot 498;
Major Jones;
Robertson Davies, Toronto, until 1995

J. Boardman et al., The Marlborough gems, formerly at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, Oxford, 2009, pp. 200-203, no. 461-34

Johann Lorenz Natter was an important 18th-century gem engraver, who wrote a treatise on the art in 1754. There is an Hessonite garnet intaglio with the dog-star Sirius by Natter in the British Museum (inv. no. 1978,1002.1069), which he engraved after a gem by the ancient Greek gem cutter Gnaios. Compare the present carnelian also with the sard intaglio by Natter in the British Museum (inv. no. 1922,0213.1).

RELATED LITERATURE
J. Rudoe, 'Eighteenth and nineteenth-century engraved gems in the British Museum. Collectors and collections from Sir Hans Sloane to Anne Hull Grundy', Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschicht, 59, 1996