Lot Essay
With its architectonic fluted pedestal, foliate-carved knees and exposed talons of the claw feet, this stately tea table is one of the most impressive forms created in the Boston area. Unlike its delicate and flamboyant Philadelphia Rococo counterpart, this example assumes a bolder architectural character. Round-top tea tables were less popular in Boston than colonial Philadelphia, and therefore less abundant.
Timothy Edwards, the younger son of the renowned preacher of the Great Awakening, Reverend Jonathan Edwards, served at the Siege of Louisburg with Governor Shirley's New Hampshire regiment in 1756. A letter dated June 19, 1972 from Carl F. Edwards tracing the provenance of this tea table accompanies this lot.
A closely related example, whose similar construction and style would suggest that they were made by the same hand, is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and discussed and illustrated in Randall, American Furniture in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (Boston, 1965) p. 120-121, fig. 86.
Timothy Edwards, the younger son of the renowned preacher of the Great Awakening, Reverend Jonathan Edwards, served at the Siege of Louisburg with Governor Shirley's New Hampshire regiment in 1756. A letter dated June 19, 1972 from Carl F. Edwards tracing the provenance of this tea table accompanies this lot.
A closely related example, whose similar construction and style would suggest that they were made by the same hand, is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and discussed and illustrated in Randall, American Furniture in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (Boston, 1965) p. 120-121, fig. 86.