12th-14th century AD. A group of two blue glass tiles each with an inlaid gold foil geometric pattern based on concentric squares. Cf. Oliver, A., Ancient Glass in the Carnegie Meum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, 1980, no. 268; Gorin-Rosen, Y., Byzantine Gold Glass from Excavations in the Holy Land in Journal of the Glass Study, 57, New York, 2015, pp. 97-119; similar piece sold at Christie's, New York, 12 June 2002. 213 grams total, 93 x 76mm each (3 1/2 x 3"). Acquired in the 1980s. Family collection of a Hampstead gentleman. Property of a Japanese collector. Gold glass tiles in the 'sandwich' technique were ed for the decoration of walls of churches, public buildings and rich palaces. Pieces of this group of gold glass were retrieved in Israel. One of them came from the bathhoe area at Caesarea Maritima, which includes the remains of two gold-glass squares. It is possible to suggest that this fragment, like the one in Caesarea, represents a production stage in which a gold-glass tile with four squares was made and later cut into smaller square inlays. [2, No Reserve]