Cloth Seal, French, Nimes Silk / Serge Seal
Nimes Cloth Seal, Image & Found by Acanthus.
"There is a hole either side of the lead piece it is 17mm wide and 2 mm thick and is lead."
Single disc seal, crocodile chained to a palm tree with COL NEM to sides and NIEMS inscription curved around left border. Other side A.B. over C. (or G) with Maunufr.. in script around upper left border.
Submitted by Folkert:- "Hi Acanthus, you have found a silk seal from Nimes (France), which was famous for its silk industries in the 17th and 18th centuries. The reverse refers to the reverse of the Augustean bronze coinage at Nemausus in the first years of the 1st century AD. The motive of the crocodile chained to the palm tree refers to the foundation of Nemausus by Roman miltary veterans from Egypt."
See No.346 Fig.46, Geoff Egan,'Lead cloth seals and related items in the B.M. (B.M.occ.papers 93)', "palm tree and crocodile, COL NE(M) to sides, NIMES below // fleur-de-lis, PIERRE LARNAC around ..... The abbreviation stands for Colonia Nemauensis, the Latin name for Nimes, and the main device is the city's arms (these refer to the foundation of the original Roman colonia at Nimes by army veterans from Egypt). ... a similar seal of an early eighteenth-century Nimes maker of silk stockins and cloth, David Baumer, was found in a wreck off eastern Mexico."
From Things to See in the Languedoc: Historic Cities: Nîmes "The city’s coat of arms shows a crocodile chained to a palm tree - the device dates back to Roman times and commemorates the defeat of Mark Anthony on the Nile by the Emperor Augustus. The connection is that Augustus rewarded his legionaries with grants of land in the Roman colony here. ...... In the Middle Ages wool and silk industries brought wealth to the city. It was here that a particularly adaptable type of serge material originated. Serge “De Nîmes”, hence denim, found its way to America in 1870."
Coins with similar motifs Dupondius au crocodile.
From Paul Cannon, "This Nime’s seal is not recorded in Daniel Slowik’s extensive catalogue of 2016, nor is it recorded in the long list of Nime’s seals in Europlombs. However, the latter contains a seal with three initials in a similar triangular shape; V L above C see Euro-Plombs, Nimes - Textile lead from the city of Nimes The authors there suggest that the initials may stand for ‘Vincens Louise et Compagnie’. Treating this Bagseal’s example in the same way ie ‘A B & Co’, I searched the Nime’s records and found one ‘Alexandre Bousquet et Compagnie’ in Nimes in 1788. He is described under ‘Fabrique de Bas’, ie Stockings Factory. The related part of the entry reads:
“Fabrique de Bas
Mrs* Alexandre Bousquet et Compagnie
Cette maison est établie de père en fils depuis deux générations. Elle consomme le produit de sa fabrique dans le Nord et en Italie, ayant perdu comme les autres son debouché en Espagne. Elle peut faire travailler encore dans une année ordinaire 80 metiers.”
*a plural abbreviation for Monsieurs, not the English word ‘Mrs’.
See Michael Sonenscher’s thesis for a Doctor of Philosophy (University of Warwick) on “Royalists and Patriots: Nimes and its Hinterland in the late Eighteenth Century” (1977). A considerable part of the thesis, written in English, describes the framework knitters of Nimes at this time and contains a huge amount of information about the industry and people involved in it. [NB the copy from which this has been made has many of the page numbers cut off] At the end of Chapter 9 (p167) it contains, as Appendix B, “Etat des principaux Entrepreneurs des manufactures, et negociants en Gros de la ville de Nismes”. The document from which this is copied is dated 15 May 1788 and contains the above extract referring to ‘Alexandre Bousquet et Compagnie’.
Slowik records one example of another seal definitely by Alexandre Bousquet & C(omp), of a different type. He also details others recording F. Bousquet and the Bousquet Brothers. (Slowik p 28-30). Slowik, Daniel: “Les plombs de scellé; L’industrie de la soie de Nîmes” (2016)"
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