Ormolu

A Japanese Kakiemon bowl of c. 1670 fitted as a perfume-burner with Parisian gilt-bronze mounts, ca 1730. A reversed bowl provided with a gilt-bronze knob to make a cover, is not shown.

Ormolu (from French or moulu, signifyinggold ground or pounded) is an 18th and 19th-century English term for what the French call bronze doré. The modern term is gilt bronze though, confusingly, the alloy of copper and zinc, sometimes with an addition of tin is technically brass.

The tint of ormolu approximates closely to that of gold; it is heightened by a wash of reddish-gold lacquer, colored with dragon's blood, by immersion in dilute sulphuric acid, or by burnishing. The best gilt-bronze is gilded by the mercury process, in which an amalgum of mercury and gold is applied, then the mercury is druiven off in a sealed furnace (the mercury fumes being deadly poison).

The principal use of ormolu is for the mountings of furniture and porcelain. With it the great French ebenistes of the 18th century obtained results which, in the most finished examples, are almost as fine as jeweler's work. The mounts were cast by the lost wax method, and then chiselled and punched. Rococo gilt-bronze tends to be finely cast and lightly chiselled and part burnished. neoclassical gilt-bronze is often entirely chiselled and punched with extraordinary skill and delicacy to create finely-varied surfaces.

This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica.

Categories: 1911 Britannica | Alloys