The goldsmith should have a furnace with a hole at the top so that the smoke can get out. One hand should govern the bellows with light pressure and with the greatest care so that the air pressed through the nozzle may blow upon the coals and feed the fire. Let him have an anvil of extreme hardness on which the iron or gold may be laid and softened and may take the required form. They can be stretched and pulled with the tongs and the hammer. There should also be a hammer for making gold leaf, as well as sheets of silver, tin, brass, iron, or copper. The goldsmith must have a very sharp chisel with which he can engrave figures of many kinds on amber, hard stone, marble, emerald, sapphire or pearl. He should have a touchstone for testing, and one for distinguishing steel from iron. He must also have a rabbit's foot for smoothing, polishing and wiping the surface of gold and silver. The small particles of metal should be collected in a leather apron. He must have small pottery vessels and cruets, and a toothed saw and file for gold as well as gold and silver wire with which broken objects can be mended or properly constructed. He must also be as skilled in engraving as well as in bas relief, in casting as well as in hammering. His apprentice must have a waxed table, or one covered with clay, for portraying little flowers and drawing in various ways. He must know how to distinguish pure gold from latten and coper, lest he buy latten for pure gold. For it is difficult to escape the wiliness of the fraudulent merchant.
Alexander of Neckham, 12th century (quoted in Medieval Craftsmen: Goldsmiths)
- St. Eligius in his workshop, Lives of the Saints (BNF Fr. 183, fol. 248v), first half of the 14th century
- St. Eligius in his workshop, Lives of the Saints (BNF Fr. 185, fol. 182), second quarter of the 14th century
- The Calling of St. Eloy by Taddeo Gaddi, c. 1360
- Goldsmith (Dance of Death), book of hours (PML M.359, fol. 145r), c. 1430-1435
- Goldsmiths in the Mendel Hausbuch:
Staffelstein (1431),
Niclos Vogelsteiner (1469),
Wilhelm Mair (1509),
Wolff Prussel (1572),
Hanns Rapoldt (1618),
Friderich Direr (1632)
- Portrait of Jan de Leeuw by Jan van Eyck, 1436
- St. Eligius in his Workshop by Petrus Christus, 1449
- St. Eligius in his Workshop, c. 1450
- A goldsmith’s workshop, Schachzabelbuch (WLB Cod. poet. 2, fol. 188v), 1467
- Mercury and His Children, the Wolfegg Housebook, c. 1475-1485
- A goldsmith's shop, Book of simple medicines (BNF Fr. 9136, fol. 344), fourth quarter of the 15th century
- Portrait of Dürer's father by Albrecht Dürer, 1490
- Portrait of the goldsmith Jörg Seld by Hans Holbein the Elder, 1497
- Portrait of a goldsmith by Ridolfo Ghirlandaio
- Portrait of a goldsmith by Gerard David, c. 1495-1500
- Goldsmiths in the Landauer Hausbuch:
Melchior Lau,
Pangraz Storchel (1530), Hans Wayrer, August Döring,
Niclaus Steingriener,
Cuntz Rott (1543),
Frantz Binder (1608)
- St. Eligius in his Workshop, c. 1501-1533
- Portrait of a jeweler, possibly Giovanni Pietro Crivelli by Lorenzo Lotto, c. 1509-1512
- St. Eligius in his Workshop by Niklaus Manuel, 1515
- A goldsmith from Mecheln by Albrecht Dürer, c. 1520-1521
- Pangratz Storchel (1530) and Cuntz Rott (1543) in the Landauer Hausbuch
- Portrait of the goldsmith Jörg Zürer of Augsburg by Christoph Amberger, 1531
- Portrait of Thomas Peyrl by Christoph Amberger, 1540
- The Jeweler by Anthonis Mor, c. 1549
- Portrait of a goldsmith, possibly Steven van Herwijck by Anthonis Mor, 1564
- Portrait of the goldsmith Paul Goepfer in Schneeberg by Matthias Krodel the Elder, 1570
- Portrait of the Braunschweig goldsmith Dietrich Kostede by Ludger tom Ring the Younger, 1570
- Portrait of Johann Jakob König by Paolo Veronese, c. 1575-1580
- The Goldsmith's Workshop by Étienne Delaune, 1576
- Portrait of a goldsmith by Hans Hoffmann, 1580
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