"Only a fraction of the jewels made for the Tudor and Jacobean courts have survived, and it is through the evidence of portrait painting and artists' designs that their splendour and variety can be assessed. This was an exceptional period in the history of the jeweller's art, when the wealthy were gripped by a passion for display and recorded their favourite jewels in glittering portraits. This book surveys the making and wearing of jewellery from late medieval simplicity, through the full flowering of the art of the Renaissance goldsmith, to the emphasis on stones rather than settings in the reign of James I."--Jacket.