Chest-on-stand
Category
Furniture
Date
circa 1840 - 1860
Materials
Painted and varnished wood, ebonised detail
Measurements
109 x 102 x 64 cm
Place of origin
Bareilly, Northern India
Order this imageCollection
Packwood House, Warwickshire
NT 557656
Summary
A painted and varnished wood chest on stand, Bareilly, Northern India, circa 1840-1860. Decorated overall with figures, pagodas, foliage and buildings in landscape settings, the chest with a hinged lid and a panel to each side and the front outlined in black, the stand of X-shaped form carved with leafy foliage, floral rosettes, anthemion and paw-like feet.
Full description
This type of chest on stand was made in Bareilly, a city in Northern India, situated 250 kilometres east of New Delhi. In 1801 it was ceded to the East India Company and was a stopping point on the route between Calcutta and Delhi. By the 1820s it was renowned for the production of Western style furniture, incorporating into its decoration both Western motifs and Chinese Export designs. Until quite recently, such furniture was often misidentified as Chinese and this example at Packwood House was previously catalogued as such. See A. Jaffer 'Furniture from British India and Ceylon', V&A Publications, 2001, p. 269, Fig. 95 for a similar example and p. 268 for a discussion on Bareilly. The V&A Museum in London has a similar example in their collections (No. 02325: 1,2)
References
Jaffer 2001 : Amin Jaffer, Furniture from British India and Ceylon, a catalogue of the collection in the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Peabody Essex Museum, London, V&A publications, 2001., p. 268 & 269