Rock of ages
Petronella Wyatt
Ali my life I have striven. Many things ave eluded me: renown, greatness, godlike wisdom and, more importantly, the world's most handsome and sensitive man, Cartier watches and Chanel handbags, etc. Well, I did have one of the last, only for it to be snatched away from me by muggers a few months ago. But one of the grails which I have sought has finally turned up. A Roman ring. By that I don't mean a ring from a tourist-trap jewellery shop in Rome, or even from Bulgari, but a real Roman ring, with an intaglio, first worn by some lovely and perhaps tragic Roman matron in Augustus' or Tiberius' day.
Ever since I was 20 I have been looking for such a ring. I found a shop near the British museum that sold Roman coins, but the owner told me that he hardly ever received rings and that most of them looked as though they had been trampled. He suggested that I visit some of the jewellers around Bond Street. I went to two.
'I'm looking for a Roman ring,' I announced to a man in a tail coat. Reluctantly, he brought out a tray. I recall that there were three rings, if you can call them that. They resembled squashed beetles. 'How much are they?' I asked. The frosty answer came back, 12,000 or L3,000.' I bid a hasty goodbye.
The years passed, Then, a few months ago, a friend of mine was looking on eBay, the online auction. 'Did you know that they sell Roman rings?' she said. 'I wouldn't vouch for their provenance, but have a look.' I rushed home and typed in eBay. Then I entered 'Roman rings'.
To my astonishment, about six came up, all with detailed photographs. They looked extraordinarily fine, especially a gold intaglio ring dating from about the 2nd century AD. The starting price was £350. In my wild enthusiasm, I decided to bid. Alas, bidding on eBay is more difficult than getting A grade at A-level. For security reasons, one has to think of a series of complicated code names and passwords. Most of
the ones I thought of had already been taken. After an hour I came up with something that looked like an algebra formula. How on earth was I going to remember it? Still, it seemed silly to give up now. That is, until they told me that before I could even bid I had to type in my credit-card number. Did they take me for a sucker? It would be only a matter of days before someone perpetrated credit-card fraud and took all my money. I typed in my credit-card number.
The auction for this ring was nearly over — there were about three hours to go. (Most of the eBay auctions last a few weeks.) I made my bid and prayed that the seller was reputable. What if the gold wasn't gold and the stone was plastic? But here I was, on the point of realising one of my lifelong dreams. There was no time for 21st-century cynicism.
The next day I received an email from eBay saying that I had won the ring. Before it could be posted to me from its location in Hampshire, I was required to make the payment. I authorised the amount and had a stiff drink. I suspected I would never see the ring and would be down a couple of hundred quid at the same time. Then I received an email from the actual seller, a man called Barry. This seemed an inpropitious name for a purveyor of antiquities. But he thanked me for the money and assured me that the ring would arrive by special delivery a day and a half later.
It didn't. At this point I became distinctly nervous. I sent Barry an email. There was no reply. I cursed myself for an imbecile. The following day Barry responded. He was sure the ring would turn up 'tomorrow before noon'. By this time I was wondering how I could get my money back. Tomorrow arrived. The morning crawled by. Then, at 11, the doorbell rang. By God, it was a special delivery. A large brown envelope. The ring was encased in bubble wrap. I tore at it. The ring fell on the floor with a plop, When I picked it up, I was dumbstruck. So this is what you get on eBay? It was stupendous, stunning, magnificent. The stone wasn't plastic either, as I tried to set fire to it and failed.
Then, suddenly, I realised that I hadn't bothered to find out my ring size. What if it had belonged to a very fat senator or a sketetal girl of 15? To come this far and not be able to wear it. Fortunately, it fitted. But I did discover something of sociological interest. The band was much flatter than the round bands of modern rings. This is true of all Roman rings. The Romans, one concluded, must have had very spatulate fingers. I had a mental picture of Cicero and other orators gesticulating with hands like packets of frozen fish fingers. Could Cassius really have had such a lean and hungry look if his pinkies resembled flattened pork sausages?
You see, you can learn something apart from sexual perversion from the Internet. I shall try for Roman earrings next. I wonder if Calpurnia had ginormous earlobes.
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