The military tailor John Jones died in 1882, bequeathing to what is now the Victoria and Albert Museum his extensive collection of largely seventeenth- and eighteenth-century French fine and decorative arts, along with three bookcases, of which this is one.

Jones commissioned a young architect, Charles Forster Hayward, to design four bookcases for his chambers above his business premises at 6 Regent Street. They were made between c.1858 and 1863 by John Howard & Sons of Berners Street. The first (c.1858; 1079-1882) was of double height and made to contain the prizes of Jones’s library, editions of Shakespeare’s first three Folios (1623–64). Three low carved oak bookcases followed; the first (1859; private collection) was elaborately carved but has no painted decoration, and was not part of the Jones Bequest. It was followed by this bookcase, which was painted and partly designed by Edward John Poynter (1860–1) and finally, one painted by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1862–3; 1080-1882).

In January 1859 Hayward first met William Burges (1827–1881), a medievalist and key figure in the revival of painted furniture in Britain. Hayward may have seen furniture – some decorated by Poynter who had returned from his studies in Paris in 1860 – at the architect’s Buckingham Street office. He certainly saw examples at the Architectural Exhibition of 1859, where exhibits included Burges’s ‘Yatman’ cabinet and ‘Wine and Beers’ sideboard, both painted by Poynter in 1858 (V&A Circ.217-1961 and 8042-1862). In July 1860, at Hayward’s request, Burges wrote to Poynter offering him the commission.

Hayward’s papers reveal that this bookcase is the second version; an earlier bookcase decorated by Poynter was almost completely destroyed by fire around the time of its completion in January 1861. The first version also incorporated painted figures below the roundels, though their subject is not known. The second, replacement bookcase was made in 1861, at which point Jones decided he did not want to include painted figures any more, although the roundels were retained. The painted heads by Poynter represent Historia Antiqua (Ancient History) and Historia Nostra (Our History), as identified by the Gothic lettering carved below them on the left and right sides respectively. If, as seems likely, they were replicas of those on the earlier version, the two figures below presumably corresponded in theme and were identified by lettering on gold backgrounds.

The top was made of enamelled slate using a technique patented in 1840 by George Eugene Magnus (1801–1873), proprietor of the Pimlico Slate Works. Each corner features a cartouche containing a male or female head representing a continent, also designed by Poynter. For the central ornament of the original top, Poynter designed a portrait of the writer and historian Thomas Babington Macaulay, Baron Macaulay (1800–1859), based on a photograph taken in 1856 and contained within a quatrefoil; this was flanked by female heads representing Poetry and Eloquence. However, the design of Macaulay and his muses does not appear on the top of the second bookcase. Parts of the carving may have been executed by William Henry Baylis, the documented carver of the bookcase decorated by Rossetti (1080-1882) as well as a carved oak panel in the Renaissance Revival style also in the Museum's collection (852-1868).

Later in life, Hayward restored the late fifteenth-century Guest House in Lingfield, Surrey, between 1896–7, living there until his death. In 1930 the house was inherited by his son, Arthur Baldwin Hayward, who bequeathed the house to Surrey County Council in 1954. A photograph of the Guest House, taken by Hayward c.1900, is in the collection of the V&A (E.5252-2000).