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16th Century Italian Cypress Penwork Chest, Val d'Adige

Price:$3,600

$4,650List Price

About the Item

A fine 16th century Italian cypress wood joined tabletop chest, the hinged top enclosing the original interior compartments and secret drawers. Inside and out decorated with penwork scenes of David slaying Goliath. The interior penwork wonderfully preserved, an old master drawing on wood. The technique of flat, incised decoration with a cut away, punched background, known as intaglio carving (from the Italian ‘cut in’), is a feature of northern Italian and Alpine woodwork from circa 1300. Cypress wood chests of various sizes like this one with inked scenes over intaglio carving have traditionally been associated with the Adige region of NE Italy but actually seem to have been made more widely across northern Italy from circa 1500-1620. Cypress wood (like cedar to which it is very similar), is relatively soft and easy to carve, but has an attractive color and scent. The distinctive intaglio surface designs were worked using very small chisels, square punches and ink, presumably applied with a metal knib. A wide range of lively scenes are depicted: hunts and battles, Biblical or literary subjects, animals and mythical beasts. Darkening of the wood over time, and fading of the inks mean that the outside decoration is often hard to read, while the unfaded insides have remained much more vivid. Chests of this class were exported to destinations all over Europe and are frequently mentioned in English inventories of the 16th and early 17th century. Chests and boxes made of cypress or cedar were useful particularly for storing valuable and fragile textiles. In 1666, John Evelyn mentioned the use of cypress for chests as 'resisting the Worm, Moth, and all putrefaction to eternity'. The 'cypress chests' containing 'arras, counterpoints, costely apparel, tents, and canopies, fine linen, Turkey cushions ... pewter and brass and all things that belong to house of house-keeping' are mentioned in Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew. One such cypress chest, filled with bed-hangings, was listed in the 1626 Inventory of Cockesden (P. Thornton, Furniture History, 1971, p. 68). A group of related chests, surviving in English churches, are discussed by Charles Tracy, Continental Church Furniture in England, Woodbridge, 2001, pp. 142-157. Medium. Examples are in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Dimensions:
Height: 7.75 in (19.69 cm)Width: 19.75 in (50.17 cm)Depth: 11.75 in (29.85 cm)
Style:
Renaissance (Of the Period)
Materials and Techniques:
Cypress
Place of Origin:
Italy
Period:
16th Century
Date of Manufacture:
circa 1550
Condition:
Wear consistent with age and use. The top has a some splits and old repairs, the hinges replaced. Interior lids have original cotter pin hinges, two of the three interior small drawers replaced. Overall excellent condition for a box over 450 years old.
Seller Location:
Stamford, CT
Reference Number:
1stDibs: LU80306092953

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