Music stool
Sebastien Erard (1752 - 1831)
Category
Furniture
Date
circa 1818 (purchased)
Materials
Maple, pine, beech, paint, gilt, ormolu, brass, iron, damask
Measurements
48.5 x 49 x 49 cm (the seat)
Place of origin
London
Order this imageCollection
Attingham Park, Shropshire
NT 608181.1
Summary
A blue-japanned and gilt-highlighted music stool, English, circa 1818, made by Sébastien Erard (1752 - 1831) of London, part of a set with NT 608181.2, a blue-japanned and gilt-highlighted duet stand. Both now green japanned but probably originally they were blue but have discoloured over time. The square padded seat upholstered in original cream floral damask which is fixed with brass studs. The seat rails japanned and decorated in gilt with meandering foliage and flowers. The seat adjusting on a screw set into a short broadening and ring-turned column decorated with anthemion. All raised on three rectangular-section downswept legs painted with gilt lines, birds, arabesques, husks and garlands and fitted with a pair of chased paw and acanthus-cast ormolu feet. -- Unlike the stand, this stool is marked. All three legs are stamped 19, and one stamped 19s. An inked mark to the underside of one seat rail reads 34387. The gold damask cover for the piano stool is numbered 609594 / ATT/T/072
Full description
This stool, and its accompanying japanned duet stand, were purchased in 1818 at the same time as Thomas Noel Hill, 2nd Baron Berwick (1770 - 1832) purchased a harp from the firm of Sébastien Erard (1752 - 1831) for his wife Sophia (née Dubouchet), 2nd Lady Berwick (d. 1875). A bill dated 27th May (or Aug?) 1818 records the purchase of 'a patent double movement harp elegantly ornamented' for the sum of £168. 'A musick stool to correspond' cost £10 10s; 'a musick stand' cost £9 9s. Sophia was having harp lessons at the time from the fashionable musician and harp teacher from France, Robert Nicolas-Charles Bochsa (1789 - 1856). Lord Berwick went bankrupt in 1827 and he and his wife went to live in Italy to escape the creditors. After her husband's death in 1832, Sophia wrote to her brother in law, William, 3rd Lord Berwick to try and get some of her possessions back. She wrote: ‘…my harp stand & stool as belonging to my Harp & being light I would wish sent to me.’ Her music stand and stool never reached her as they remain at Attingham today. (Megan Wheeler, 2017)
Provenance
Purchased in 1818 by Thomas Noel Hill, 2nd Baron Berwick (1770 - 1832) from the firm of Sébastien Erard (1752 - 1831) for £10 10s. Listed in the Inventory taken at Attingham Park in 1861 (p. 102), the Inventory taken there in 1913 (p. 78), the 1947 Probate Inventory (p. 31) and the Inventory taken c. 1953 (p. 31, no. 19). When listed in the Inventory of 1913, it was recorded with a 'trimmed velvet cover for the same' which was recorded then as being 'burnt and stained'. Thence by descent, and transferred to the National Trust from HM Treasury in 1976.
Marks and inscriptions
Seat rail: 34387 Seat rail: 19 S Seat rail (the one opposing the above): 19 One leg: 19 S (stamped) No. 11D (red paint/ink) Other two legs: 19
Makers and roles
Sebastien Erard (1752 - 1831), musical instrument maker