THE PROPERTY OF A LADY
A GERMAN BRASS-BOUND MAHOGANY CYLINDER BUREAU attributed to David Roentgen, the pierced galleried square central platform flanked by stepped rectangular plinths, the beeded panelled counter-balanced roll-top flanked by mille-raies panels and enclosing a fitted interior with two drawers and four pigeon-holes, flanked by paterae headed

Details
A GERMAN BRASS-BOUND MAHOGANY CYLINDER BUREAU attributed to David Roentgen, the pierced galleried square central platform flanked by stepped rectangular plinths, the beeded panelled counter-balanced roll-top flanked by mille-raies panels and enclosing a fitted interior with two drawers and four pigeon-holes, flanked by paterae headed
mille-raies pilaster strips above three further simulated drawers and a black leather-lined writing-surface, above two short and one long beeded and panelled drawer, flanked by paterae headed by brass flutes on mille-raies panelled square tapering legs and tapering block feet, section of brass gallery missing, late 18th Century
52¾in. (134cm.) wide; 48in. (122cm.) high; 30in. (76cm.) deep
Provenance
Purchased by the vendor's step-grandfather in Paris circa 1910

Lot Essay

The rectangular tambour-desk with balustraded Grecian stepped-cornice for vases, clock or sculpture, reflects the elegant 'antique' style introduced by David Roentgen (d. 1807), cabinet-maker of Neuwied-am-Rhine and Ebeniste mécanicien to Louis XVI, while working for the Russian Court in the later 1780s. A desk of this form that was sent to Russia about 1785, includes the hermed legs, fine figured mahogany and restrained ormolu enrichments of flat-banded mouldings, Egyptian-striated panels, paterae and pearled borders. It is now displayed together with matching games-tables in the Palace of Pavlovsk (see: J.M. Greber, Abraham und David Roentgen, Starnberg, 1980, fig. 680). It shares other features, including the ribboned laurel-wreath handles and roll-top panel with shallow recessed borders, with a desk, now displayed in the Hohenzollernmuseum, Berlin (see: Greber, op cit., fig. 675)

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