Embroidery drill used by ballerina Marie Taglioni (1804-1884). Bone and metal

Needlework drill of metal twisted 'spine' ending in a brass mount and topped with a shaped bone mount; fitted to the 'spine' is a metal screw hinged to a metal holder with a bone handle.

Cyril W. Beaumont Bequest

The needlework drill came with an attached note written in Margaret Rolfe's hand: "This drill was used by Marie Taglioni to pierce holes in a peculiar kind of needle-work frame when the embroidery needed stretching. She lent it to my grandmother who never returned it. Margaret Rolfe."
The needlework drill is part of a unique collection of memorabilia and personal effects which evoke Marie Taglioni in the last decades of her life. She was a keen needlewoman and the collection contains both examples of her own work and her personal sewing accessories.
A collection of Taglioni memorabilia was amassed by Margaret Rolfe, the granddaughter of Taglioni's closest friend in London, Mrs Boggs Rolfe; she attended Taglioni's dancing classes and received many gifts of Taglioni memorabilia, from Taglioni herself, from her grandmother and, after Taglioni's death, from her niece, Marguerite Troubetzkoi. She kept these, with a series of related notes, in various boxes and annotated envelopes (filed separately). These she passed to Cyril Beaumont, probably for the London Archives of the Dance (a number of the objects were referred to in "The London Archives of the Dance and some of its Treasures" by Cyril Beaumont, Ballet Annual, first issue, Adam & Charles Black, London, 1947, p110); the Archives never achieved an independent home and part of the collection, including the Taglioni memorabilia, was stored with Cyril Beaumont, where it became inextricably mixed with his own collection and came to the Museum as part of the Cyril Beaumont Bequest.

S.27-1987