Chats on Old Furniture Part 1

Chats on Old Furniture.

by Arthur Hayden.

PREFACE

This volume has been written to enable those who have a taste for the furniture of a bygone day to arrive at some conclusion as to the essential points of the various styles made in England.

An attempt has been made to give some lucid historical account of the progress and development in the art of making domestic furniture, with especial reference to its evolution in this country.

Inasmuch as many of the finest specimens of old English woodwork and furniture have left the country of their origin and crossed the Atlantic, it is time that the public should awaken to the fact that the heritages of their forefathers are objects of envy to all lovers of art.

It is a painful reflection to know that the temptation of money will shortly denude the old farmhouses and manor houses of England of their unappreciated treasures. Before the hand of the despoiler shall have s.n.a.t.c.hed everything within reach, it is the hope of the writer that this little volume may not fall on stony ground, and that the possessors of fine old English furniture may realise their responsibilities.

It has been thought advisable to touch upon French furniture as exemplified in the national collections of such importance as the Jones Bequest at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Wallace Collection, to show the influence of foreign art upon our own designers. Similarly, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch furniture, of which many remarkable examples are in private collections in this country, has been dealt with in pa.s.sing, to enable the reader to estimate the relation of English art to contemporary foreign schools of decoration and design.

The authorities of the Victoria and Albert Museum have willingly extended their a.s.sistance in regard to photographs, and by the special permission of the Board of Education the frontispiece and other representative examples in the national collection appear as ill.u.s.trations to this volume.

I have to acknowledge generous a.s.sistance and courteous permission from owners of fine specimens in allowing me facilities for reproducing ill.u.s.trations of them in this volume.

I am especially indebted to the Right Honourable Sir Spencer Ponsonby-Fane, G.C.B., I.S.O., and to the Rev. Canon Haig Brown, Master of the Charterhouse, for the inclusion of ill.u.s.trations of furniture of exceptional interest.

The proprietors of the _Connoisseur_ have generously furnished me with lists of prices obtained at auction from their useful monthly publication, _Auction Sale Prices_, and have allowed the reproduction of ill.u.s.trations which have appeared in the pages of the _Connoisseur_.

My thanks are due to Messrs. Hampton, of Pall Mall, for their kind permission to include as ill.u.s.trations several fine pieces from their collection of antique furniture. I am under a similar obligation to Messrs. Waring, who have kindly allowed me to select some of their typical examples.

To my other friends, without whose kind advice and valuable aid this volume could never have appeared, I tender a grateful and appreciative acknowledgment of my indebtedness.

ARTHUR HAYDEN.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Italian Chair about 1620_]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Spanish Chest._]

I

THE RENAISSANCE ON THE CONTINENT

[Ill.u.s.tration: Portion of carved cornice of pinewood, from the Palazzo Bensi Ceccini, Venice.

Italian; middle of sixteenth century.

(_Victoria and Albert Museum._)]

CHATS ON OLD FURNITURE

I

THE RENAISSANCE ON THE CONTINENT

ITALY. Flight of Greek scholars to Italy upon capture of Constantinople by the Turks--1453.

Rediscovery of Greek art.

Florence the centre of the Renaissance.

Leo X., Pope (1475-1521).

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1520). Raphael (1483-1520). Michael Angelo (1474-1564).

FRANCE. Francis I. (1515-1547).

Henry IV. (1589-1610).

SPAIN. The crown united under Ferdinand and Isabella (1452-1516).

Granada taken from the Moors--1492.

Charles V. (1519-1555).

Philip II. (1555-1598).

GERMANY. Maximilian I., Emperor of Germany (1459-1519).

Holbein (1498-1543).

In attempting to deal with the subject of old furniture in a manner not too technical, certain broad divisions have to be made for convenience in cla.s.sification. The general reader does not want information concerning the iron bed of Og, King of Bashan, nor of Cicero's table of citrus-wood, which cost 9,000; nor are details of the chair of Dagobert and of the jewel-chest of Richard of Cornwall of much worth to the modern collector.

It will be found convenient to eliminate much extraneous matter, such as the early origins of furniture and its development in the Middle Ages, and to commence in this country with the Tudor period. Broadly speaking, English furniture falls under three heads--the Oak Period, embracing the furniture of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries; the Walnut Period, including the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries; the Mahogany Period, beginning with the reign of George III. It may be observed that the names of kings and of queens have been applied to various styles of furniture as belonging to their reign. Early Victorian is certainly a more expressive term than early nineteenth century.

Cromwellian tables, Queen Anne chairs, or Louis Seize commodes all have an especial meaning as referring to styles more or less prevalent when those personages lived. As there is no record of the makers of most of the old English furniture, and as a piece of furniture cannot be judged as can a picture, the date of manufacture cannot be precisely laid down, hence the vagueness of much of the cla.s.sification of old furniture.

Roughly it may in England be dealt with under the Tudor, the Stuart, and the Georgian ages. These three divisions do not coincide exactly with the periods of oak, of walnut, and of mahogany, inasmuch as the oak furniture extended well into the Stuart days, and walnut was prevalent in the reigns of George I. and George II. In any case, these broad divisions are further divided into sub-heads embracing styles which arose out of the natural development in taste, or which came and went at the caprice of fashion.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Frame of wood, carved with floral scrollwork, with female terminal figures.

Italian; late sixteenth century.