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Coffer

ca. 1575 (made)
Artist/Maker
Unknown (maker)
Place of origin
France (made)

Coffer of carved walnut, with incised inscription filled in with white composition. Below the hinged lid is the following inscription: -PRVDENTIA. CARNIS. MORS. IACTA. CVRAM. TVAM. IN. DOMINO. ET. IPSE. TE. ENVTRIET. PRVDENTIA. SPIRITVS. VITA. The front and ends are carved with cartouches with masks and festoons of fruit and flowers. At the angles are fluted pilasters, in front of which are placed male terminal figures; the latter rest on a projecting base ornamented with grooves and fillets.

Object details

Categories
Furniture
Renaissance (French)
Object type
Coffer
Materials and techniques
Walnut
Carving
Brief description
Carved walnut, French c1575
Physical description
Coffer of carved walnut, with incised inscription filled in with white composition. Below the hinged lid is the following inscription: -PRVDENTIA. CARNIS. MORS. IACTA. CVRAM. TVAM. IN. DOMINO. ET. IPSE. TE. ENVTRIET. PRVDENTIA. SPIRITVS. VITA. The front and ends are carved with cartouches with masks and festoons of fruit and flowers. At the angles are fluted pilasters, in front of which are placed male terminal figures; the latter rest on a projecting base ornamented with grooves and fillets.
Dimensions
  • Height: 96.5cm
  • Width: 147.2cm
  • Depth: 74cm
Marks and inscriptions
EXPOSITION RETROSPECTIVE DE LYON [Inscribed ink:] 389 M[?]E Rougier [?] (Rectangular printed label showing oval cartouche with strapwork, positioned on top left corner of back, mounted on plywood filler piece )
Credit line
Bequeathed by George Salting
Object history
Salting bequest
Bibliographic references
  • Victoria & Albert Museum: Fifty Masterpieces of Woodwork (London, 1955), no. 13. A French Renaissance Chest In the sixteenth century Italian Renaissance ornament was adopted and transformed by the artists and designers of Northern Europe, particularly in Germany and the Low Countries, who created an independent style of decoration. The strap-work, cartouches and grotesque masks, which form part of the decoration of this French chest, are characteristic features of this northern Renaissance style, and are found repeatedly in the pattern-books of such Flemish and German artists as Bluom, Dietterlein and De Vries; books of ornament which circulated among and influenced metal workers, carvers, plasterers and furniture-makers throughout the North. Among the areas most strongly influenced by Flemish designers in the second half of the sixteenth century was Burgundy, long attached by both political and artistic ties to the Low Countries. The decoration of this chest, with its lions’ heads, muscular caryatids and swags of fruit and flowers shows the influence of the architect-craftsmen of Dijon, Hugues Sambin (d. 1602), whose own designs for Furniture were strongly influenced by the pattern-books of Flanders and Germany, and who established a distinctive school of furniture-making in Burgundy, where this chest was probably made. The chest, with its simple architectural form and its bold yet restrained carving is a fine example of a French craftsman employing the characteristic ornamental style of the Northern European Renaissance. The chest forms part of the Salting Bequest, which came to the Museum in 1910. French; second half of sixteenth century. H. 38 in., L. 4.9 in., D. 23} in. W.T92-1910
  • Edmond Bonaffé, Le Meuble en France au XVI siècle (1887) p. 136 Mme Rougier avait envoyé a l’Exposition de Lyon une paire de coffres de marriage [Recueil de I’Exposition Lyonnaise, par J. B. Giraud], en bois de noyer, d’une silhouette ronflante et ventrue, rentrant sur elle-meme par une série de moulures, pour s’étaler sur une base solide servant de tiroir. Sur cette enveloppe semi-florentine, l’artiste, un lyonnais probablement, a semé a profusion des rinceaux délicatement gravés dans le bois et remplis de mastic blanc. Cette facon de damasquine sur bois, qui s‘appelait moresque blanche, offre une grande analogie avec les encadrements célébres imaginés par le Petit-Bernard pour la typographie lyonnaise. Ces coffres jumeaux appartenaient a M. Didier-Petit et figurent au catalogue de sa vente [Lyon, 1843 no. 426]. M. Rougier les avait payés 600 francs la paire.
Collection
Furniture and Woodwork Collection
Accession number
W.192-1910

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Record createdApril 1, 2005
Record URL
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O110761/coffer-unknown/
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