Excerpt from Catalogue of the Collection of Antique Gems, Vol. 2 of 2: Sassanian Oriental Mesopotamian Babylonian Assyrian Persian Hittite Cyprian Cilician Mediaeval Modern Few gems of this class have any merit as engravings, and unless far above the average in that respect or of unusually beautiful material, they never command really high prices. Some of those in my collection are contemptible 'as works of art, but keep their places as illustrations of a style utterly distinct from the Classic styles and in no way challenging comparison with them. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.