A SILVER-GILT FILIGREE PASTE-EMBELLISHED OCTAGONAL BOX AND HINGED COVER

Details

A SILVER-GILT FILIGREE PASTE-EMBELLISHED OCTAGONAL BOX AND HINGED COVER
QING DYNASTY, 18TH/19TH CENTURY

Of rectangular form with canted corners flanked by a pair of elaborate ruyi-scroll handles, the straight sides of the box inset on each facet with green, red, purple, yellow and white glass stones and yellow, green and blue enamels with flower-heads bourne on feathery stems issuing further, smaller flowerheads, the design repeated on the narrow sides of the cover, the top similarly decorated with floral stems enclosed within elaborate acanthus leaf silverwork foliate panels within a border of multi-coloured square glass stones, all reserved on variously patterned dense filigree grounds, the interior with three compartments and gilt-metal covers with fruit-form handles
10 in. (25.4 cm.) across

Lot Essay

The intricate filigree metal work combined with the use of enamels for additional details are typical of Court taste throughout the 18th and 19th centuries.

Compare an enamel-inset silver gilt octagonal box attributed to the Yongzheng period, illustrated in the Chinese University of Hong Kong exhibition, Tributes from Guangdong to the Qing Court, Hong Kong, 1987, no. 40. A related hexagonal stained ivory box included in the same exhibition displays very similar foliate decoration on an openwork ground, ibid., no. 64.

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