Chest of drawers
Category
Furniture
Date
1655 - 1670
Materials
Cedar [juniperus virginiana], Ebony, Snakewood
Measurements
1265 x 1250 x 625 mm
Order this imageCollection
Cotehele, Cornwall
NT 347767
Summary
Chest of drawers with plain panelled sides, the front veneered with ebony and snakewood and cedarwood in raised bevelled panels with applied arcade and column motifs. The piece consists of a top section of two drawers and a bottom section of three plain drawers enclosed by a pair of doors. According to Victor Chinnery (2004): An oak, cedar, ebony and snakewood veneered chest of drawers, the four-plank top with moulded and mitred cornice raised on a dentil frieze, the shallow top drawer moulded and faced with a sloped ebony plaque, the deep second drawer with recessed perspective arched central panel flanked by pairs of turned columns and by cushioned sections with octagonal frames; the lower stage enclosed with a pair of doors each with an arrangement of mouldings and cushions framing an octagonal panel veneered with a black cruciform motif, the base moulding projecting over extended stile feet; the lower doors concealing three plain drawers with wrought iron ring handles. English, probably London, c.1655-70. According to Dr Adam Bowett (2002): Chest of drawers, c.1660. This chest is of a type made between c.1650 and c.1670, and is the ancestor of all subsequent English chests of drawers. The carcass is of oak, but many of the mouldings are cedarwood and the primary veneers used on the geometric frames are of snakewood. The wood was imported from Surinam, which was an English possession between 1651 and 1667. The colony was captured by the Dutch in 1667, at which time importations of snakewood ceased. See my article in Furniture History (1998).
Provenance
According to Victor Chinnery (2004): Date of acquisition unknown, but recorded at Cotehele in this position in the King Charles Room in Nicholas Condy’s views, c.1840.