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Lot Essay
This secretaire formed part of the fabled collection of the Barons Nathaniel (d. 1905) and Albert (d. 1911) von Rothschild of Vienna. The family fortune was based on businesses established by Mayer Amschel Rothschild in Frankfurt in the 1760s. His five sons, the 'five arrows' extended the family's interests throughout Europe, primarily based upon finance, but the majority of the collections were put together by the third or fourth generations of the family well into the 19th century. This timing coincided with a period when the royal and noble houses of Europe and the landowning families of England experienced financial difficulties and dispersed their collections.
Nathaniel died childless and passed his collections on to Albert who passed them on to his sons Alphonse (b. 1878), Louis (b. 1882) and Eugene (b. 1884) who were still alive in 1938. That year the family possessions were seized by the Third Reich and subsequently passed to the Austrian State Museums. This secretaire was then returned with a number of works-of-art to the heirs of Baron Alphonse von Rothschild, whose inventory number is on this secretaire, and sold at Christie's London in 1999. An armchair from the collection of Baron Alphonse von Rothschild is lot 661 in this sale.
Nathaniel died childless and passed his collections on to Albert who passed them on to his sons Alphonse (b. 1878), Louis (b. 1882) and Eugene (b. 1884) who were still alive in 1938. That year the family possessions were seized by the Third Reich and subsequently passed to the Austrian State Museums. This secretaire was then returned with a number of works-of-art to the heirs of Baron Alphonse von Rothschild, whose inventory number is on this secretaire, and sold at Christie's London in 1999. An armchair from the collection of Baron Alphonse von Rothschild is lot 661 in this sale.