There is a legend that Emperor Alexander III once wondered whether Russian artisans could create objects as perfect as the famous gold snuffboxes made by French jewelers in the 18th century. This led the Fabergé’s head workmaster, Mikhail Perkhin, to meticulously study a snuffbox with bright-red guilloche enamel made by the Parisian jeweler Joseph Etienne Blerzy in 1777 and owned by Empress Catherine II. Inspired by it, he made his own.
He chose green as the main color in which to cover his gold oval snuffbox. Instead of The Magnanimity of Scipio, Perkhin depicted Venus and Amor in Rostov enamel on the tondo in the center of the lid. That light-toned inset, executed in the spirit of grisaille painting, was ornately framed with a set of miniscule “rose” diamonds.
The Russian jeweler’s rebuttal was deemed by experts to be even more exquisite and impeccable than its French prototype. The enamel has much fewer pores, and the fine hinge is hardly noticeable, as it does not protrude outward from the body. Alexander III, enraptured by Mikhail Perkhin’s work, ordered that both snuffboxes be kept in the Imperial Hermitage as a testament to the unprecedented achievements of the brilliant Russian jeweler.