Busacca Gallery

Fabulous look, A Rare Italian Gothic Neoclassical Multi-Faceted Octagon 3 Dimensional Faux-Antique Hand-Carved Wooden Original Mercury Mirror. The Italian Venetian Mirror has Faded in The last 150 years. gold gilding, Etched Flowers, and framed carved designs. Created around the 1850s. The workmanship is unbelievable, to have one made today would cost you a small fortune. This vintage item remains fully functional, but it shows signs of age through scuffs and dings. The age finishes are faded but beautiful. * Some history. Murano glass makers produced Venetian glass and this is what led to emergence of Venetian Mirrors. Glass made in Murano around the 15th Century was popular across Europe for it was a high quality, elegant, and beautiful product. The Venetian mirror was born on the tiny Italian island of Murano in Venice in the 15th century. Venetian mirrors were painstakingly produced, and creating one was a highly involved process. Mirrors have an intriguing and complex history which spans many countries and centuries. Mirrors have always had a clear appeal that makes it possible for people to view their image without hiding anything. The ability of mirrors to reflect natural and artificial light remains unrivaled. For instance, there was a superstition that if in case you happen to smash a mirror, you’ll have seven years of bad luck. Such a superstition originated from the ancient times as mirrors were sees as tools used by gods. Hence, they have always been coveted and appreciated since they were discovered. Before their discovery, ancient people would see a reflection of themselves in a lake or pond. People in ancient Egypt and Rome would use crude ways of seeing their reflection using mirrors made from metal and bronze. Without such reflection, mirrors would not be appreciated. In the early years, mirrors were actually believed to posses magical powers due to their ability to show a reflection. Once the technical problems of mirror production were conquered, it was time for the artisians to work their magic to make Venetian mirrors the highpoint of luxury. Early mirror frames used carved materials such as wood or ivory. Artists got to be so talented at this that sumptuary laws were passed forbidding certain carving styles from being possessed by lower-class people. Murano Island was the focal point for Venice's glass production. By the 16th century, nearly half of the island's 7,000 inhabitants were involved in the glass-making industry, and it is still a glass-making center today. Murano glass began making its way into the frames of their high-quality mirrors, using a variety of lampworking techniques such as smalto and millefiore. Murano's techniques were so prized that master glass artisans were forbidden to leave by law, and it was only with great bribes that a few were convinced to travel to other countries and share their secrets. Today, Murano glass has its own trademark of origin, certifying that the glass came from this historical location.

Mirrors have been around for millenia, but until the 1st century C.E. they were made out of highly-polished metal or volcanic glass. These mirrors produced a poor reflection and were prone to tarnishing over time. The upkeep required to maintain a metallic mirror's quality was extensive, and so this style of mirror is almost unheard-of these days. Experiments with glass-face mirrors were made, but after the fall of the Roman Empire much of the knowledge was lost and wasn't rediscovered until the 11th century in the Moorish Empire. A thousand-years of mirror development was lost to the world! To make a perfect glass mirror, there were two major technological hurdles to overcome. First, a perfectly clear sheet of glass was necessary to protect the mirror surface while still allowing light to pass through cleanly. Second, a suitable reflective surface needed to be developed that would cling to the glass and the back of the mirror. The second problem was solved with the discovery of a tin-mercury amalgam that hardened into a reflective surface. No one knows where this technique was first developed, but it soon became widespread. All glass mirrors made prior to the 19th century were made using mercury and tin. Later, much safer techniques using silver and aluminum replaced the mercury. The problem of producing clear plate glass is where Venice comes in. Venice, and especially the nearby island of Murano, were the foremost centers of glass production for centuries. It was Venetian artists who perfected making clear plate glass. They also made modifications to the tin-mercury amalgam, adding gold and bronze in special proportions to make the images reflected even more beautiful. Early Venetian mirrors that were made using all these techniques cost about as much as a ship, and were highly sought after by royalty.

Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror

The first mirrors used by humans were most likely pools of dark, still water, or water collected in a primitive vessel of some sort. The requirements for making a good mirror are a surface with a very high degree of flatness (preferably but not necessarily with high reflectivity), and a surface roughness smaller than the wavelength of the light. A mirror or reflector is an object such that each narrow beam of light that incides on its surface bounces (is reflected) in a single direction. This property, called specular reflection, distinguishes a mirror from objects that scatter light in many directions (such as flat–white paint), let it pass through them (such as a lens or prism), or absorb it. The earliest manufactured mirrors were pieces of polished stone such as obsidian, a naturally occurring volcanic glass. Examples of obsidian mirrors found in Anatolia (modern–day Turkey) have been dated to around 6000 BC. Mirrors of polished copper were crafted in Mesopotamia from 4000 BC, and in ancient Egypt from around 3000 BC. Polished stone mirrors from Central and South America date from around 2000 BC onwards. By the Bronze Age most cultures were using mirrors made from polished discs of bronze, copper, silver, or other metals. In China, bronze mirrors were manufactured from around 2000 BC, some of the earliest bronze and copper examples being produced by the Qijia culture. Such metal mirrors remained the norm through to Greco–Roman Antiquity and throughout the Middle Ages in Europe. During the Roman Empire silver mirrors were in wide use even by maidservants. Speculum metal is a highly reflective alloy of copper and tin that has been used for mirrors until a couple of centuries ago. Such mirrors may have originated in China and India. Mirrors of speculum metal or any precious metal were hard to produce and were only owned by the wealthy.