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Seales
Desk seals made by foremen of Russia, Western Europe and the Far East are also included in the museum collection. Seals of this kind were widely spread and existed longer than other forms, such as rings-seals and charm-seals that had gone out of fashion to the middle of the 19 century. In the museum exposition there are both metal seals made of bronze and steel, and stone ones, which are real articles of stone carving and jewelry art. Foremen carved these seals on the most different kinds of hard stone and chose especially clean ones: rock crystal, topaz and amethyst or intensively, unusually coloured 'painted' pieces of jasper or agate. The small size of seals made it possible to choose for them a stone of "jewelry" quality, for example, lazurite of deep dark blue tone or evenly coloured cornelian.
The materials of handles of desktop seals are rather various. Besides stone and metal, they were made of ivory, wood, or of combination of different materials, for example, mother-of-pearl and metal. The shapes of handles are also varied. The majority of seals have the handles of the compound geometrical form, and sometimes they even represent busts of the well-known people (so, the agate seal representing A. S. Pushkin is kept in the museum).
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