Casket

Object Type
Caskets like this were used by girls in the 17th century for storing small personal possessions. The caskets were fitted inside with a variety of compartments, suitable for keeping jewellery, cosmetics, writing equipment and letters, needlework tools, tiny toys or keepsakes. They often had mirrors set into the lids, for dressing, and sometimes had secret drawers for particularly precious possessions. This casket has 11 secret drawers.

Ownership & Use
The panels would have been worked by a young girl, aged about 11 or 12. A girl's needlework education began with embroidered samplers and the decoration of smaller objects like pin cushions. It finally culminated in making the panels for a casket. The girl would embroider a series of small panels, drawn with pictorial scenes taken from engravings. They would then be sent to a cabinet-maker to be made up into the casket.

Materials & Making
This casket has the extremely rare feature of sheets of mica, a shiny transparent mineral that can be easily split. It has been laid over the embroidery to protect it. This device is particularly suitable for the type of embroidery on this casket, silk laid work, which makes a flat but vulnerable surface. Tiny fragments of mica were also often incorporated into 17th-century embroidery to indicate reflective surfaces, for example the windows of a house, a fishpond, or the mirror held up by a mermaid.