Hand Engraving Glossary - by Roger Bleile -  Sponsored by Steve Lindsay  -  Leave Feedback                   

VIBRO-GRAVER™ - A marking tool powered by a vibrating electric motor. Also known as a Burgess Vibro-Graver™, this tool is also manufactured under a wide variety of similar names. Correctly titled, this tool is a freehand electric stippling machine since it does not remove metal in the manner of a graver but rather creates dots by displacing metal. Many engravers use a vibrating stipple tool to create textured background in scrollwork.

VIGNETTE – A picture, illustration, or depiction, especially one of a small or dainty kind. Scrollwork, leaves or flowers usually frame a hand engraved vignette.

VITREOUS ENAMEL - The colorful result of fusing powdered glass to a substrate by firing, usually between 750 and 850 degrees Celsius. The powder melts and flows and hardens to a smooth, durable vitreous coating on metal, glass or ceramic. In the jewelry and goldsmithing trades, engraving or gillouche is sometimes combined with vitreous enamel to create ornate effects. Vitreous enamel is also sometimes called “hard fired enamel.”

Pictured is an example of translucent vitreous enamel over a guilloche enraved background.

VOLUTE – A volute is a spiral scroll-like ornament that forms the basis of the Ionic order, found in the capital of the Ionic column. The word derives from the Latin voluta ("scroll"). The ornament is used as an element of Renaissance and Baroque architecture and is a common decoration in furniture design, metal and ceramics.

Pictured is an illustration of volute carving on an Ionic capital.