Rectangular lidded box. Wood, overlaid with bone panels

Rectangular lidded box of apparently glued construction, overlaid with ivory panels, painted with arabesques (red, blue and green and gilt), and with overlaying painted pilasters and brackets (black and gilt).
The lift-off lid (with applied edge mouldings) is subdivided by painted brackets, and the upper face is divided by thin (c1mm) walnut (?) fillets overlapping the edges of the bone panels, into nine compartments (four small corner, four larger rectangular and one larger central square).
The box (also with applied edge mouldings at the base and upper edge) is divided by an applied cornice into an upper and lower stage, with fluted columns above and brackets below. Note that single columns and brackets (cut with a right-angle behind) have been used at the corners.

Box and lid have been lined (before 1866, when it was marked with the Museum number) with red paper, with painted gilt marbling. (X-Rays, 2023, indicate no evidence for the box having ever been fitted with internal dividers or inserted feet). The bottom is painted black with gilt marbling of a similar character to that on the paper lining. Underneath this painted layer are traces of similar gilding on the bare wood. There are six small copper alloy lion-headed fittings with screw threaded shanks (two on the front, two on the back of the box, and two on the lid); these are now missing the cords that they would have held.

The box is relatively crudely constructed, with glued butt-joints (and mitred mouldings). Various areas have been reglued, and some areas have been overpainted.

Bought from the Farrer sale for £4.10.0.

Report by J C Robinson on acquisitions made at the Farrer sale at Christie's (MA/3/20/7 RP/1866/16903)
'Description of objects purchased at the Farrer Sale, Christie & Manson June 1866.
Square box with removeable lid, overlaid with panels of bone richly decorated with paint & lacquered[?] arabesques in the Arabic style – the framework in lacquered work ornaments with attached columns or pilasters, consoles etc. Venetian work(?) circa 1550. Height 6 ¾” width 6”
Purchased at frames sale. Price £4-10-0'

Henry Farrer FSA 1848-1864, was a miniature painter in 1822, subsequently picture dealer and picture restorer, by 1858 also dealer in antiquities. In 1864 he was operating from 106 New Bond St. He had 'a long and fruitful relationship' with the South Kensington Museum, lending or selling Renaissance and other objects (Clive Wainwright, 'The Banker, the Prince and the Dealers: Three Renaissance objects in the Victoria and Albert Museum', Apollo, vol.151, February 2000, pp.41-6). For further information on Farrer’s dealing and collecting activities, see Mark Westgarth, ‘Dictionary of 19th century antique & curiosity dealers’, Regional Furniture, vol.23, 2010, pp.99-100).
Information taken from NPG website (6/10/2023)
https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/research/programmes/ directory-of-british-picture-restorers/british-picture-restorers- 1600-1950-f


Some evidence suggests that this was a toilette box (cassa da pettenti) used for combs, brushes and other small objects useful for the toilette. A strikingly similar box survives in the Kunsthistorische Museum, Vienna (Sammlung für Plastik und Kunstgewerbe, Inv. no. 4103-4122), from the collection of Archduke Ferdinand II of Tyrol, with internal compartments (unlike 217-1866) which contain six ivory combs, brushes, a gilt pair of scissors, various iron instruments, a bone earspoon, a mirror and a filigree glass bottle, and is 'veneered with bone pilasters and mother of pearl panels with orientalizing motifs in translucent colour. Silken cord with gold thread and tassel pulled through lion masks on the case and lid.' (WINDISCH-GRAETZ, Franz: Möbel Europa. 2. Renaissance-Manierismus (Munich, 1982), p.242). A print from Giovanni Andrea dalla Croce Chirurgiae universalis opus absolutum, Venice, 1596 (illustrated in Thornton, The Italian Renaissance Interior (London 1991), fig. 270, shows a box of this form hanging from a high shelf beside a mirror with shutter (cf V&A 218-1866) in a bed chamber, presumably useful for the toilette. Bartolomeo Scappi (Opera Venice, 1570, tavola XXIV) shows a similar rectangular lidded box (without obvious painted decoration) containing implements for the toilette. Hans Huth (1971) p.5 places the V&A box within this class of toilette cases.

The box is relatively crudely constructed, with glued butt-joints, and it may be that it was constructed by members of the painter's workshop who lacked (or were prohibited from using) more sophisticated construction skills. The same type of construction is seen on a casket in the Metropolitan Museum, New York with painted bone plaques and rosewood veneers (cataloguer to check this)

For discussion of this type of painted decoration, see
Hans Huth: Lacquer of the West. The History of a craft and an industry, 1550 - 1950. (Chicago, 1971), chapter 1; Peter Thornton, Form and Decoration (London, 1998), chapter 3; Clelia Alberici: Il Mobile Veneto (Milan, 1980), p.61ff.; Anna Contadini 'Middle-Eastern objects' in At Home in Renaissance Italy, eds.Marta Ajmar-Wollheim and Flora Dennis (London, 2006), p308ff.; Monika Kopplin, European Lacquer (Munich, 2010), pp.23-34

Fine lacquerwork was made in Persia during the 16th century. It was commonly decorated with moresques executed in gold: this was done on relatively small items, such as folding book-rests, book-covers, containers for writing materials, etc. Such objects excited the admiration of Europeans whenever they saw them, and early imitations of this work embodying moresque decoration were made in Venice. The technique was deemed suitable for embellishing the covers of highly important government documents, so apparently carried no light-hearted or frivolous connotation in the way that imitations of Chinese artefacts were often to do later. Venetian lacquer was also used for making small objects, such as jewel caskets covered with moresques, although entirely occidental figure-subjects occasionally occupy panels within the imitation Islamic ornament. Sometimes the ground of the panels in such work was made of mother-of-pearl which reflects light back through the painted deocration applied on to it. A similar effect was contrived with a gold ground over which painted decoration was applied; the colours were often applied so as to form ‘the ground’, leaving the pattern itself unpainted (reserved as it is called).. exemplified on the V&A ‘Queen Elizabeth virginals’ (about 1570) or a harp ordered for the private orchestra of Duke Alfonso d’Este (1581, Rome). Thornton pp.34-5

Huth says that from the 13th century Venice had been an entry point to Europe for goods (earthenware, metalwork, textiles, jewelry and lacquerware) from the Levant and Orient [sic]. A Venetian document of 1283 consists of rules for the depentores (those working with a brush, involved in the production of varnished caskets, tables and woodwork). The decoration of wares as opposed to simply protecting them with varnishes seems to have begun during the mid 16th century. A Syrian craft which may have inspired Venetian artisans working in lacquer was the practice of damascening metal, known in Milan and Venice as early as 1300. The Italian craftsmen (no non-European craftsmen were supposed to reside in Venice) who practised this art were called azziministi. Another non-European craft introduced to Venice from the late 15th century was the practise of fashioning elaborate bindings for books. Venetian copies or adaptations of lacquered bindings ‘in the Persian style’ date from the middle of the 16th century (eg Binding, Museo Correr 1570-77). European engravings based on Moresque designs, such as those by ‘the Master F’, were circulating in Italian workshops as early as 1520. Venetian shields of wood covered with parchment, painted with knotwork and scrolls, and with areas in white, red and green that shone through the varnish, giving the effect of lacquer survive in armeria of the Doge’s palace (Venice ) and from the household of the Bishop of Salzburg. Huth discusses other types of object (probably Venetian) with similar decoration, which may have been what was referred to by Italians variously as ‘frissi grottesche’, ‘alla zemina’ in the Persian manner, ‘petteniera turchesca’ in the Turkish manner: a quiver case, a folding table, small cases (casse da pettenti), caskets (scrigni or possibly what was known as ‘casse da conzar il cao’, boxes for dressing the hair), mirror frames and frames of architectural form with or without inset marble plaques, cuoridoro shields (described by Contadini in At Home in Renaissance Italy eds. Ajmar-Wollheim, and Dennis, pp.319-321), cabinets with leather coverings and musical instruments such as harpsichords and harps.

Kopplin notes that Venice traded in shellac, mainly from north-east India, Indochina and Sumatra, and maintains that Islamic lacquered objects (made from as early as the 10th/11th centuries) were undoubtedly present in Venice by the 16th century. Recent studies of the techniques used found that Venetian 'lacquer' was generally made up of linseed oil and colophony derived from pine resin, a composition also mentioned in contemporary writings such as Leonardo Fioravanti (1517-1588) in his 'Compendio di secreti rationali' (Venice 1562). Turpentine of larch, also known as 'Venice turpentine' was also used, though not sandarac, the most important resin in Islamic lacquerwork but problematic on account of its limited availability and complex preparation. Arabesques were applied in powdered gold on the black-painted wood, and gold leaf employed for gilding larger decorative surfaces which were then given a luminous glow through a lustre finish in a variety of colours. Tempera was probably used as well as oils, and a final coat of glossy varnish applied. These studies suggest that the stylistic imitation of Islamic models was coupled with the use of largely identical techniques (p.24, citing Adriana Rizzo, 'Le "laque" vénitien: Une approche scientifique', in Venise et l'Orient 828-1797, exh. cat., Institut du monde arabe, Paris (2006), pp. 244-51)

Comparable objects
-V&A W.180-1910
-Kunsthistorische Museum, Vienna inv. no. 4103-4122
-Kunstgewerbemuseum, Berlin, inv. 1901,38 a, b

This box may have been used for combs, brushes and other small personal accessories. Contemporary illustrations show such boxes hung on the wall in a bed chamber beside a dressing mirror with similar decoration. This type of decoration appears to have been a Venetian speciality, found from about 1570 on musical instruments, book-bindings, caskets and frames. The lustrous colours painted on bone, ivory (or sometimes mother-of-pearl) emulated the decorated surfaces of imported products which were probably described at the time as alla zemina (in the Persian manner), or petteniera turchesca (in the Turkish manner).

217-1866