champlevé (shäNləvā`), technique for the enamel enamel, a siliceous substance fusible upon metal. It may be so compounded as to be transparent or opaque and with or without color, but it is usually employed to add decorative color. It was used to decorate jewelry in ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome.
..... Click the link for more information. decoration of metal objects. It was used by the Celts and Romans and employed by medieval metalworkers for jewelry and reliquaries reliquary (rĕl'əkwĕr`ē), receptacle containing the relics of saints and other sacred objects of the Christian religion.
..... Click the link for more information. until the 14th cent. Champlevé is produced by hollowing out parts of a design in metal and filling in the hollows with enamel. The technique has been revived by 20th-century craft-workers.

champlevé

Detail of a champlevé crucifix by Godefroid de Claire, 12th century; in the British Museum

(credit: Courtesy of the trustees of the British Museum)

Decorative enameling technique. The process consists of cutting away cells or troughs in a metal plate and filling the depressions with pulverized vitreous enamel. The raised metal lines between the cut-out areas form the design outline. Champlevé was practiced in the Celtic areas of western Europe in the Roman period. It flourished in the Rhine Valley near Cologne and in Belgium in the 11th–12th century. The most notable enamelers were Nicholas of Verdun and Godefroid de Claire.