A gold-mounted lapis lazuli snuff box, possibly Italian, circa 1735

The earliest examples of French gold-mounted hardstone snuff boxes date as far back as 1726-32, as an example by Nicolas Bouillerot (active 1720-1754) shows (Sophie Mouquin, Agate, Jasper and Sardonyx: Gemstones in French Mineralogical Collections of the Eighteenth Century, in Alexis Kugel, London, 2012, p. 75). It was also in France where the quality of lapis lazuli, the semi-precious hardstone, was first recognised for its beauty and subsequently copied for objects made from other materials: Sèvres’ so-called bleu-lapis ground colour had been extremely popular since its early Vincennes period; see for example the ‘Vase Parseval’, circa 1751, in the Belvedere Collection (Joanna Gwilt, Vincennes and early Sèvres porcelain from the Belvedere collection, London, 2014, no. 96, p. 161), and has had several revivals since, celebrating the stone's magical combination of deep blue and gold. Lapis lazuli was first mined in northeast Afghanistan around 7000 BC, and enjoyed the same popularity in Italy in the 18^th and 19^th century as it did in France. Roman micromosaics and Florentine pietra dura works often incorporate lapis lazuli. A number of designs for snuff boxes in the Archivio dell’Opificio dell Pietre Dure in Florence feature this semi-precious stone (Anna Maria Massinelli, Hardstones, The Gilbert collection, London, 2000, p. 153).