Chest Front thumbnail 1
Chest Front thumbnail 2
Not on display

Chest Front

1500-1525 (made)
Artist/Maker
Unknown (maker)
Place of origin
Suffolk (made)

Portion of a boarded chest front in oak. Below the lock plate (now missing) are diagonal bands of ornament. On either side is a rounded arch carved with leaf designs and filled with ornament resembling tracery.

Object details

Category
Woodwork
Object type
Chest front
Materials and techniques
Oak
Wood
Oak
Carving
Brief description
Portion of a boarded chest front in oak. Eastern Counties of England, ca. 1500-25.
Physical description
Portion of a boarded chest front in oak. Below the lock plate (now missing) are diagonal bands of ornament. On either side is a rounded arch carved with leaf designs and filled with ornament resembling tracery.
Dimensions
  • Height: 33cm
  • Width: 96.5cm
Dimensions taken from departmental notes
Credit line
Given By Mrs Graham Rees-Mogg
Object history
Bought on the Museum's behalf by Mrs Rees-Mogg from Frank Jennings (12 Holland Street, W.8), along with a chest W.428-1922 and another chest front (W.429-1922). They were delivered to the Museum from Walberswick, Suffolk, and the acquisition file records that it had been purchased by a former owner in Ipswich. A pencil sketch elevation (author unknown) is with the RP 22/7208.
Bibliographic references
  • Charles Tracy, English Medieval Furniture and Woodwork (London, 1988), cat. no.309. 'PORTION of a boarded CHEST-FRONT; below the lock-plate (now missing) are diagonal bands of ornament; on either side is a rounded arch carved with leaf design and filled with ornament resembling tracery. Given By Mrs Graham Rees-Mogg Oak. Early 16th century 33 x 96-5 Cm Mus. No. W.430-1922 East Anglia Purchased by a former owner at Ipswich'.
  • Sherlock, David. 'Suffolk Church Chests', Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and History, 2008. p. 28 Three more chests carved with Gothic fronts are now in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, their provenances uncertain but conceivably from Suffolk. One, purchased by a former owner at Bury St Edmunds, has a front 'carved with two rows of ornament, the upper composed of quatrefoils and trefoils, and the lower of a row of narrow arches of late perpendicular character. Below the front is a portion of carved spandrel' (Tracey, 1988, no.302); from Ipswich a chest front has 'diagonal bands of ornament; on either side is a rounded arch carved with leaf design and filled with ornament resembling tracery' (ibid, no.309); and from Lavenham comes a chest with sexfoil ornament. On one side is a row of interlacing arches filled with bands of spiral ornament, and on the other is side potions of similar arches (ibid, no.308). The front of the Bury chest has traces of its original red paint, a reminder that all the above chests may have originally been colourfully painted. The handful of decorated chests mentioned above do not amount to much compared with the quantity of woodwork on screens and bench ends in the country; nor can they be said to represent any particular country or regional style of carving.
Collection
Furniture and Woodwork Collection
Accession number
W.430-1922

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Record createdFebruary 27, 2007
Record URL
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O132447/chest-front-unknown/
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