as early as the fourteenth century, they are being produced here to the present day. Silver spoons of sixteenth-century manufacture are preserved in great numbers; they are all adorned with humorous posies both in Polish and Latin; Polish poets of the period—Nicholas Rey, for—instance were in the habit of supplying such verses to the goldsmiths.—From the latter half of the sixteenth century French influences begin to predominate, many French goldsmiths settling at Cracow, one Pierre Remy among them. This current of French influence lasts through the whole of the seventeenth century. Among the native goldsmiths of this period there are some distinguished craftsmen, e.g., Samuel Piaskowski, who produced, in 1614, a badge for his guild in the shape of a large signet-ring with a relief.
The art of medallion-making makes a fine start in the Renascence period. The museums of Cracow all contain precious collections of medals of this time, the artists being for the most part Italians, such as Caraglio, Padovano, an anonymous one of 1527, and others. The Cracow Mint, under the administration of Justus Decius, was famous for the model coin that came from it. The copper and brass founders displayed a vigorous activity; but when the greatest bell in Poland was to be cast for Cracow cathedral, the task was entrusted to a German, John Behem of Nuremberg (d. 1533). His "Sigismund Bell," by its size and perfect shape as well as by the clear, deep, sonorous tone, is to be reckoned among the best that ever were cast. Another Nuremberg master, Sebaldus Singer, modelled the elaborate trellis door of the Sigismund Chapel, which was cast by Master Servats between 1525 and 1527. The great variety of such trellises in the several chapels, the considerable number of bronze baptismal fonts, and the ornamental guns of the period, all prove the excellence of Cracow founders and the generosity and good taste of those who gave orders for such work. For personalities, we may single out Oswald Baltner, brassfounder and gunsmith to the king; he had come from Nuremberg, and his work done at Cracow in the years 1559-1575 chiefly consists of guns noble in shape and adorned with reliefs (not unlike those in the arsenal at
