Antique Chinese Wooden Table

A wooden table from Scandinavia, produced circa 1900. A graceful side table featuring a sliding drawer with original lock and key. Looking like it sprang from a Hans Christen Anderse...

A 20th century wooden side table with a metal frame, from Central Europe. With a charmingly rustic wooden top perched on slim metal legs, this side table presents a versatile profile...

A wooden side table made in early 19th century France. This small table features a drawer and shelf with carved surround. Intricate scroll and leaf pat...

A wood patinated table from France, produced circa 1900. An antique occasional table with original yellow patination, featuring a sliding side drawer with engraved floral motif metal...

A wooden table created in France circa 1900. Long and expansive, this forthrightly constructed table offers a rustic charm and a wealth of surface area. Through time, the wood has dr...

A wooden side table from 1930s central Europe. Constructed nearly in the dimensions of a cube, this solidly constructed table catches the eye as a cha...

Beautifully time-worn, antique, Southern European, chestnut wood end or side table. This relatively small size antique table is a joy to look at and the history of this kind of table makes it very interesting as well. Pay tables or paying tables were initially used by tax collectors and later in time (in the latter part of the middle ages), when most cities started to have their own currency, came the need for 'money exchangers'. A lot of the first money exchangers in 'early Netherlands' came from the Italian region of Lombardy and their name for these paying tables was 'banco'. Yes, it is this where also the English word 'bank' originates from. Pretty soon these money exchangers, who mainly serviced businessmen and travelers, also started 'safekeeping' and lending money. These tables therefor are at the very root of banking and just like some banks in this day and age, some of these earliest 'bankers' did not keep enough cash in their tables to be able to pay out when clients needed their money. This sometimes would lead to a lynching whereby the table of that particular money lender would be broken into pieces. The Italian word for such a broken table...

1970s bamboo imitation wooden side table with wooden top.

Highly decorative Chinese polychromed altar table. The red-painted rectangular top is decorated in a foliate motif throughout with three panels, ...

Chinese Chippendale style side table with fretwork detail around apron & carved legs with paw feet.

Vintage 1970s Spanish faux bamboo wooden side table.

An elegant Chinese side table with ornate open carving flanking two front drawers, 19th century. Dimensions: H90 x W101.5 x D62.5 cm.