Johann Martin Bückle (1742-1811) | German, Frankfurt am Main, 1809 | Cameo with Karl Theodor von Dalberg (1744-1817)

Karl von Dalberg was a highly important figure in Germany during the Napoleonic period. Hailing from the noble Dalberg family, he was appointed prince-primate of the Confederation of the Rhine in 1806, and, following the Treaty of Schönbrunn in 1810, was made Grand Duke of Frankfurt. The medallist Johann Martin Bückle’s glyptic portraits of his patron Karl von Dalberg were the study of two extensive articles by the French scholar and collector Michel Duchamp (op. cit.). The present ring with cameo portrait can be identified with the ring represented by the painter Joseph Chabord in his self portrait in the Historisches Museum Frankfurt (Duchamp, 1997, op. cit., fig.2). The presence of the period inscription dedicating the gift to Chabord and dated 1809, is a strong indication that the ring is that represented in the portrait, which was executed the following year in 1810.

The present cameo is very close to another by Johann-Martin Bückle in the Cabinet des médailles, Bnf, Paris (inv. no. Camée. 987a). Further gyptic portraits of Dalberg are in the Fitzwilliam Museum (inv. no. PER.M.70-1923) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (inv. no. 40.20.18).

RELATED LITERATURE

M. Duchamp, ‘Quelques portraits de Carl von Dalberg prince primat de la confederation du rhin’, The Medal, 1989, pp. 39-45; M. Duchamp, ‘Camées et médailles (IV): Nouveaux portraits inédits de K. von Dalberg et de J. J. Cambacéres’, Hiers numismatiques: Revue trimestrielle de la societé d’etudes numismatiques et archeologiques, Juin, 1995, no. 124, pp. 39-45