Posts Tagged ‘antique desk designs’

Earlobes, necks, wrists and fingers are among the chief parts of the human anatomy which lend themselves to applied decoration. As with so many innovations in the field of jewellery, the practice of piercing the fleshy protuberances of the ears for the attachment of ornaments symbolic of race, tribe and status seems to have originated in Western Asia. A sculptured slab from the palace of Ashurnasirpal II (8 83-8 59 BC) in the British Museum depicts the king in profile wearing a long earring with an acorn-shaped terminal. At various stages of history men, women and children have been subjected to the ordeal of ear-piercing, though the male fashion for earrings has been mysteriously intermittent and sometimes a national rather than a cultural phenomenon.
English courtiers adorned themselves with single pearl drop earrings in the late 16th and early 17th centuries but some hundred and fifty years later, when similar ornaments were worn by French officers, the vogue aroused astonishment and hilarity in England. Thomas Rowlandson capitalized on the reaction in 1786 with a cartoon showing French officers in various stages of donning their uniforms-, they all sport earrings. Eleven years later the diarist Mrs Lybbe-Powys was struck by the sight of a French emigre officer in Bath ‘with large gold earrings’. But for all the British distaste, the custom had become general in France and Italy, from the highest to the lowest. Napoleon himself did not wear them, but his brother-in-law Joachim Murat, whom he made King of Naples in 1808, undoubtedly did. In the mid-197os, when the fashion recurred, young Englishmen were among the most enthusiastic proponents of the emblematic use of a single earring.
There is no evidence of the methods employed to pierce ears in prehistoric times but references in more recent centuries establish that the well-to-do employed the services of professional jewellers when the girls in the family were considered old enough to wear earrings. The experience for the victims was usually made palatable by the prospect of possessing a pair of ornaments of their very own. But even that prize was sometimes insufficient. The august presence of a royal jeweller, Dutens, summoned by Mrs Delany to attend her niece Mary Dewes in 1756, failed to persuade the young girl to submit to the operation. She held out for two months before succumbing. Girls of less affluent families were subjected to amateur attention with the aid of a needle, which pierced the ear while the lobe was supported by a piece of wood or other solid material. A cork was popular in the 19th century and later.
Children were dressed as miniature adults until the late 19th century and the ornaments worn by girls reflected contemporary fashions. There are comparatively few breaks in the history of female earrings charted by the authors, the longest being the Middle Ages, when the fashion for swathed heads concealed not only the hair but the ears as well. In the late 16th century women showed a renewed interest in ear ornaments, especially in the pearl drops which predominated for the next century and a half and survived thereafter. They were far more comfortable to wear than the girandole earrings which rivalled the drop type from the late 17th century. Usually comprising a top, an intermediate device such as a bow and three (or more) drops, these articles were so heavy that a secondary loop was often attached to the hook which passed through the ear and a ribbon threaded to the hook to be secured to the hair, taking some of the weight off the ears. This device helped, but many women reduced the period of discomfort by carrying their earrings in their pockets to parties and balls and assuming the ornaments on arrival, padding the backs of the lobes with small pieces of silk.
Fashionable women inevitably suffered permanent distension of the earlobes, which were dragged down by the weight of the girandoles. This fate did not prevent their descendants from participating in another fashion for huge earrings in the late 182os and 183os and suffering the same consequences. One of the most enthusiastic young adherents of the vogue was the future Queen Victoria, who often wore her grandmother Queen Charlotte’s girandole earrings of 1761. Photographs of Queen Victoria in old age, when she sometimes took to simple single-stone or pearl earrings, show them lodged on elongated earlobes. Fortunately the huge variety of new types and fittings means that no one now has to wear one kind of earring for a prolonged period.
The earliest archaeological evidence for earrings dates from the 3rd millennium Bc, but it seems likely that men
and women will have adorned their ears with, for example, shells and polished peb-
bles for centuries before that.
The idea of piercing the earlobe to insert a metallic ornament originated in the Orient. From the start earrings can be divided into two types: the simple rigid hoop in its numerous variations, and the more elaborate articulated pendant. In Antiquity, they were amongst the most popular means of personal ornament.
Around 2500 BC Sumerian women were adorning their ears with gold earrings in the form of single or double crescents, as revealed by findings in the royal graves of Ur in what is now Iraq. The crescent form, comprising two thin sheets of gold soldered together with a hollowed centre, was a simple yet successful design which was to spread towards the West and remains to this day a favourite shape of earring. More elaborate Babylonian examples of the early 2nd millennium Bc, also from Ur, show how the simple crescent motif could be embellished with embossed decoration, the details picked out with filigree and granulation.
Minoan and Mycenean
Early examples of earrings with a tapered hoop design, in a way a thinner version of the crescent- or boat-shaped earring, have been found in graves in Anatolia and Greece. Hooped earrings of gold, silver and bronze, tapered at the ends, have also been excavated in Crete and date from the Middle Minoan period (2000— 1600 BC).
It is not until the second half of the 2nd millennium BC that we find variations and elaborations of the crescent or hoop type; during the Late Minoan and Early Mycenean period (i 600— i 100 Bc) earrings in the form of scalloped or tapered hoops were common in Mycaene, while in Crete during the same period the most widespread form of earring consisted of a tapered hoop decorated with a conical pendant representing a clear progression from the earlier simple hoop.
The tapered hoop supporting a conical pendant was also popular in Cyprus, where several examples come from 13th and 12th century BC graves in Enkomi. Judging from the number of extant examples, this type had a long life; a less elaborate version consisting of a tapered hoop supporting a smaller bead cluster is well testified both in Crete and in Cyprus; it may have been cast in one piece, as a steatite mould of this shape has been found in Crete. This type continued in Cyprus throughout the Dark Ages, reappearing amongst Greek designs of the 7th century BC.
By the end of the 2nd millennium BC, the hoop earring, tapering to a different degree at each end, was widely dispersed in the Aegean world, Western Asia, Cyprus and Syria, as revealed by many excavations.
In Cyprus, from the middle of the 2nd millennium BC, and particularly during the third quarter, earrings were very popular and may have had some supernatural significance, since contemporary painted terracotta idols in the form of stylized nude females, probably fertility symbols, have their earlobes pierced two or three times and large terracotta hoops suspended from them.
The simple, tapered hoop was worn there from about 1400 BC, where it arrived possibly from Crete but more likely from Syria; it continued in Cyprus for a long time, surviving throughout the Dark Ages, and was reintroduced from there into Greece around the 7th century BC.
A variation of this type, of either Cypriot or Syrian invention, consists of a hoop of twisted or plaited gold wire. Also to be found is the ‘leech’ earring, a sort of elongated tapered hoop, the lower part expanded into a fat crescent motif. Hoops supporting clusters of beads or elongated conical pendants decorated with granulation were, as we have already seen, as popular in Crete as they were in Cyprus. A typical Cypriot earring of the 13th century BC was a hoop supporting a bull’s head pendant stamped out of thin sheet gold. Although the shape of the pendant is a common Mycenean motif, no contemporary examples have been found on the Greek mainland.
When, in about 1 100 BC, the Mycenean world succumbed to the Achaean invasion, which was followed by the three centuries of poverty and near-barbarism known as the Dark Ages, the arts declined and jewellery in precious metal became rare. It is likely that the main sources of gold at the time were the tombs of earlier periods. Among the limited number of gold ornaments such as finger-rings, bracelets, pins and fibulae, there survived a small number of spirals, the purpose of which is still not certain, but which may have been earrings or hair-ornaments.
The brilliant civilization of Cyprus was destroyed at the same time, but traditions lived on and the Achaeans left intact the long-established Mycenean techniques. Goldsmiths worked throughout the Dark Ages preserving and perpetuating forms and designs that were to be reintroduced into Greece around the 7th century BC.

Nabeshima and Hirado
NABESHIMA
The porcelain of Nabeshima (named after the ruling clan) was made at Okawachi, north of Arita, probably from the latter half of the 17th century until c.1870, exclusively for the ruling shogun and feudal lords. As this ware was the preserve of the aristocracy, little of it except “kiln wasters”, or seconds, would have reached the West before the late 19th century. A few examples have been sold at auction since World War II (including some of questionable date). Apart from a few pieces of hollow-ware – bottles, vases, boxes, and censers –most surviving items are dishes. In that category the majority are saucer dishes with exceptionally tall foot-rims (over 1.2cm high); the remainder are small pieces of various shapes.
Nabeshima ware is arguably the most refined of all pre-19th-century Japanese porcelain. The decoration is imaginative, timeless, and meticulously executed. The most popular themes are seasonal flowers or wintry trees, sometimes combined with underlying or juxtaposed patterns, which may be derived from waves, Chinese trelliswork, or basketry. This type of decoration could only have been
achieved by using a stencil or some kind of transfer-printing technique. For example, the repetitive geometric pattern called “calm-water” (seigaha) shows no evidence whatsoever of individual strokes, with their inevitable variations in intensity. Designs are often entirely outlined in underglaze blue with enamel infilling of iron red, turquoise, yellow, pale manganese, and black detailing, in a technique that recalls the doucai
porcelains dating from the early Ming period in China. The glaze is of a soft, pale, greyish-blue tone.
A feature of the characteristic Nabeshima saucer dishes is the underglaze-blue decoration on the
tall foot, which is found on most
pieces. The decoration consists
of a continuous band of
elongated “teeth” resembling
a comb, known as kusitakade.
The underside of the rim is
usually painted with beribbonec
coins (known as “cash”), clump
of formal flowers, or undulating foliage. Like much Nabeshima ware, saucer dishes tend to be decorated in colours, as this was
more desirable than the standard blue.
HIRADO
Some of the earliest Japanese blue-and-white porcelain was produced at Hirado, near Arita, toward the beginning of the 17th century. Production at the sites of Kihara and Nanko was made possible through the employment of immigrant Korean potters. The later wares, from another site at Mikawachi where production is thought to have begun c.1760, are the most familiar. These wares, either white or blue and white, were made from the very pure clay from the island of Amakusa, allowing the most intricate modelling and refined potting.
Production consisted of censers, brushpots, jars, vases, bottles, teawares, bowls, and dishes. From c.184( some of the larger pieces were applied with dragons or shi-shi (a depiction of the Buddhist lion) as either handles or knops. Other pieces were moulded in shallow relief with isolated flower-heads, symbols, or trellis. Blue-and-white wares were sensitively painted in a slightly blurred underglaze blue of varying tone. The most popular themes are children at play or vertiginous landscapes, but birds and large botanical subjects were also used. Border embellishment is invariably small and includes pointed leaves and pendant tassels.

Nabeshima
• BODY virtually flawless
• POTTING thin and always very neatly executed
• GLAZE subtly grained; a soft, bluish appearance
• PALETTE usually polychrome – underglaze blue, iron red, yellow, turquoise green, pale manganese/tan, and, very rarely, black
• FORMS mainly flatwares; saucer dishes
• DECORATION natural subjects
Hirado
• BODY pure white with an “icing-sugar” texture
• GLAZE a soft, bluish hue
• PALPATE either white or blue and white
Marks
Nabeshima wares arc never marked; Hirado wares are sometimes marked with the place of manufacture, occasionally with the potter’s or decorator’s name, or, most rarely, with a date

EUROPEAN BUREAUX
Bureau cabinets of this period made in Germany and Italy usually display the full-blown Rococo style. Well before the mid-18th century, German princely courts such as those at Wurzburg, Dresden, Ansbach, and Berlin set the pace for Rococo at its most adventurous, and bureau cabinets were among the extreme Manifestations of the style. Exaggerated cabriole curves, vigorous serpentine shapes, and concave and bombe forms were inlaid with exotic materials, covered in marquetry and parquetry, and encrusted with gilt-bronze Mounts made by virtuoso craftsmen. The Italian Pietro Piffetti (c.1700-c.1777) took this already exuberant rite even further in the ivory inlaid bureau cabinets he made for the Palazzo Rcale in Turin. While bureaux and bureau cabinets from other parts of northern Italy such as Venice and Genoa, were le , ostentatious, they were
bold in their curves and often decorated with painting in light colours, or with a type of decoupage known as arte povera.
By contrast, the wealthy burghers of northern Germany and The Netherlands took a less flamboyant line, favouring bureau cabinets of restrained design, usually made of well-figured walnut. Such pieces increasingly fell under the restraining influence of British design, while conceding to more southern tastes with bombe and serpentine outlines to their bases.
Early 18th-century French writing furniture took an entirely different turn from that of Britain and most of Europe, but some new types related to the bureau were developed around the mid-century. During the Transitional period, when the curvaceous Rococo was being gradually discarded for the restrained and symmetrical Neoclassical style, small desks with cabriole legs, serpentine sides, and fine floral marquetry were especially favoured for ladies’ apartments. The bureau de dame( has a sloping top of conventional bureau form. Another type, known as a bureaua
 cylindre, has a horizontally slatted tambour top set into grooves on either side, allowing it to slide over the writing surface within. One of the most accomplished exponents was Jean-Francois Oeben (1721-63), 1-63), who is credited with the invention of the roll-top desk with its rigidly curved slide. His successor as one of the leading Parisian cabinet-makers was Jean-Henri Riesener (1734-1806), who continued the tradition of ingenious mechanical pieces and specialized in roll-top desks. Riesener’s output ranged from sumptuous pieces decorated with elaborate marquetry and gilt-bronze mounts to plain mahogany desks of no less fine craftsmanship. The German cabinet-maker, David Roentgen ( 1743-1807), produced bureaux of outstanding quality, in terms of both their marquetry decoration and the ingenious mechanisms with which they were often fitted. In Vienna, which was an important centre of furniture-making in the early  19th century, simple cylinder desks were executed in native woods such as walnut, cherry, pear, and maple, mainly for a middle-class clientele.
• COLLECTING the colour of early bureaux is a crucial
factor in determining value - examples showing exceptional colour can command very high prices; slope-fronted bureaux are more desirable than secretaire cabinets or secretaire bookcases.
• BEWARE if the top of a bureau is unusually deep (i.e.
over 3 lcml 12in wide) it may formerly have been the base of a bureau bookcase, in which case the veneering will have been added at a later date
• HANDLES check that all signs of handle holes to the backs of drawer fronts have corresponding scars on the veneered front; if they do not all correspond, the piece has either been reveneered at a later date or the drawer is associated.