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Lot Essay
André-Charles Boulle, appointed ébéniste, ciseleur et doreur du Roi in 1672
BOULLE'S MEDAILLERS
This sumptuous ebony casket incorporates finely chased grid-like frames incorporating fleurs-de-lys from the medal drawers of a Louis XIV médailler, almost certainly one of the celebrated set of eight ordered by the silversmith Nicolas Delaunay from André-Charles Boulle. These were listed in the inventory drawn up following the 1715 acte de délaissement between Boulle and his sons as follows:
huit petits médaillons (médaillers) commencez pour M. de Launay dont la moitié sont d'amarante et le reste à faire de marqueterie, valant 480l
(J.P. Samoyault, André-Charles Boulle et sa Famille, Geneva, 1979, p. 66).
The médaillers, with their abundance of royal imagery, most notably the medals themselves of all the Kings of France, would have been destined to be sold to members of the Royal court, and were most likely completed before the end of 1715 in time to have been offered as New Year's gifts. Nicolas Delaunay (1638-1727), Orfèvre ordinaire du Roi, was also appointed conseiller, directeur contrôleur et garde de la monnaie de médailles on 22 November 1696, and carried out 'les beaux dessins des pièces qu'il fait faire pour sa majesté'. It is therefore likely that he also was involved in the design of the médaillers ordered from Boulle.
Two of the four médaillers by Boulle with an amaranth ground were sold from the collection of Hubert de Givenchy, Christie's Monaco, 4 December 1993, lot 10. Two of the four médaillers with tortoiseshell ground were in the collection of the duc de Bourbon at Chantilly, and are now in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris. The fact that other médaillers from the set were dismantled is indicated by a further four frames of the same design in the collection of the marquis de Biron, sold Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 9-11 June 1914, lot 224, now in the Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon (illustrated P. Verlet, Les Bronzes Dorés du XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1987, p. 144, fig. 184).
GREGORY DE LIGNE GREGORY
This médailler in its present form, with Boulle's Louis XIV ormolu frames inset with lapis lazuli, all within an ebony structure, and with the addition of more Italianate mounts, is also fascinating for its reflection of the taste among sophisticated antiquarian collectors in the early 19th century, particularly in England, for reinterpreting the luxurious products of the ancien régime.
The exhibition label on the underside, inscribed that it was loaned by a 'Mr. Gregory' of Grantham, indicates that the casket was almost certainly acquired or commissioned by Gregory De Ligne Gregory, who amsssed an important collection of furniture and works of art in the 1820's and 1830's for Harlaxton Manor, Lincolnshire, which is a few miles outside Grantham. Harlaxton, originally a modest Tudor manor house, had been inherited through marriage by the Gregory's in the 1750's, and had been largely neglected, until de Ligne Gregory commisioned the fashionable architect Anthony Salvin to create one of the most outstanding and grandiose examples of Tudor revival architecture of the period. Work was started in 1831, and the house was not fully completed until 1855, having already cost the huge sum of £100,000 by 1835. Gregory was a passionate collector, described by a contemporary in 1836 as 'a man possessed with a great love for art and architecture who had been for many years a collector of objets de vertu in France and Italy' (as quoted in a 1906 article in Country Life).
Gregory died in 1854, and much of his collection was subsequently sold at Christie's London in 1878, although the medal-casket does not appear in this sale. An indication of the breadth of the collection, typical of the catholic taste of the era, is given by the title of the sale, which was described as 'CONSISTING OF Pictures, Sculpture, Tapestry, Silver-plate, Old French Decorative Furniture of the time of Louis XIII, XIV, XV and XVI, Rare Marbles, Fine Or-Molu Work, Rock-Crystal Chandelier, and other Decorative Objects, being a portion of the Collection formed by the late GREGORY GREGORY, ESQ.,, For the Adornment of his Seat, Harlaxton Manor House, Lincolnshire...' The impressive quality of the collection is demonstrated by a superb Louis XIV bureau plat, lot 95 in the 1878 sale, and later sold in these Rooms from the collection of French and Company, 24 November 1998, lot 30 ($1.2 million exc. premium).
It is not known if Gregory patronised any of the fashionable London dealers and cabinet-makers such as Edward Holmes Baldock and Robert Hume, who catered to the opulent taste of the sophisticated collectors of the early 19th century such as William Beckford, George Watson Taylor and the Earls of Lonsdale and Pembroke. The possibility of the involvement of a marchand-ébéniste such as Baldock should certainly not be discounted for this medal-casket, with its clever reuse of elements of Boulle's médailler, combined with the more Italiante grandeur of the lapis lazuli panels and the mounts of the frieze and the angles. This is typical of the practices of the period, when pietra dura panels from monumental 17th century cabinets were reused, Boulle marquetry pieces from the Louis XIV period were broken up and the marquetry panels reincorporated into more fashionable, smaller scale pieces and Renaissance hard-stone objects were remounted, while frequently wholly new pieces were created in the antique style.
BOULLE'S MEDAILLERS
This sumptuous ebony casket incorporates finely chased grid-like frames incorporating fleurs-de-lys from the medal drawers of a Louis XIV médailler, almost certainly one of the celebrated set of eight ordered by the silversmith Nicolas Delaunay from André-Charles Boulle. These were listed in the inventory drawn up following the 1715 acte de délaissement between Boulle and his sons as follows:
huit petits médaillons (médaillers) commencez pour M. de Launay dont la moitié sont d'amarante et le reste à faire de marqueterie, valant 480l
(J.P. Samoyault, André-Charles Boulle et sa Famille, Geneva, 1979, p. 66).
The médaillers, with their abundance of royal imagery, most notably the medals themselves of all the Kings of France, would have been destined to be sold to members of the Royal court, and were most likely completed before the end of 1715 in time to have been offered as New Year's gifts. Nicolas Delaunay (1638-1727), Orfèvre ordinaire du Roi, was also appointed conseiller, directeur contrôleur et garde de la monnaie de médailles on 22 November 1696, and carried out 'les beaux dessins des pièces qu'il fait faire pour sa majesté'. It is therefore likely that he also was involved in the design of the médaillers ordered from Boulle.
Two of the four médaillers by Boulle with an amaranth ground were sold from the collection of Hubert de Givenchy, Christie's Monaco, 4 December 1993, lot 10. Two of the four médaillers with tortoiseshell ground were in the collection of the duc de Bourbon at Chantilly, and are now in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris. The fact that other médaillers from the set were dismantled is indicated by a further four frames of the same design in the collection of the marquis de Biron, sold Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 9-11 June 1914, lot 224, now in the Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbon (illustrated P. Verlet, Les Bronzes Dorés du XVIIIe Siècle, Paris, 1987, p. 144, fig. 184).
GREGORY DE LIGNE GREGORY
This médailler in its present form, with Boulle's Louis XIV ormolu frames inset with lapis lazuli, all within an ebony structure, and with the addition of more Italianate mounts, is also fascinating for its reflection of the taste among sophisticated antiquarian collectors in the early 19th century, particularly in England, for reinterpreting the luxurious products of the ancien régime.
The exhibition label on the underside, inscribed that it was loaned by a 'Mr. Gregory' of Grantham, indicates that the casket was almost certainly acquired or commissioned by Gregory De Ligne Gregory, who amsssed an important collection of furniture and works of art in the 1820's and 1830's for Harlaxton Manor, Lincolnshire, which is a few miles outside Grantham. Harlaxton, originally a modest Tudor manor house, had been inherited through marriage by the Gregory's in the 1750's, and had been largely neglected, until de Ligne Gregory commisioned the fashionable architect Anthony Salvin to create one of the most outstanding and grandiose examples of Tudor revival architecture of the period. Work was started in 1831, and the house was not fully completed until 1855, having already cost the huge sum of £100,000 by 1835. Gregory was a passionate collector, described by a contemporary in 1836 as 'a man possessed with a great love for art and architecture who had been for many years a collector of objets de vertu in France and Italy' (as quoted in a 1906 article in Country Life).
Gregory died in 1854, and much of his collection was subsequently sold at Christie's London in 1878, although the medal-casket does not appear in this sale. An indication of the breadth of the collection, typical of the catholic taste of the era, is given by the title of the sale, which was described as 'CONSISTING OF Pictures, Sculpture, Tapestry, Silver-plate, Old French Decorative Furniture of the time of Louis XIII, XIV, XV and XVI, Rare Marbles, Fine Or-Molu Work, Rock-Crystal Chandelier, and other Decorative Objects, being a portion of the Collection formed by the late GREGORY GREGORY, ESQ.,, For the Adornment of his Seat, Harlaxton Manor House, Lincolnshire...' The impressive quality of the collection is demonstrated by a superb Louis XIV bureau plat, lot 95 in the 1878 sale, and later sold in these Rooms from the collection of French and Company, 24 November 1998, lot 30 ($1.2 million exc. premium).
It is not known if Gregory patronised any of the fashionable London dealers and cabinet-makers such as Edward Holmes Baldock and Robert Hume, who catered to the opulent taste of the sophisticated collectors of the early 19th century such as William Beckford, George Watson Taylor and the Earls of Lonsdale and Pembroke. The possibility of the involvement of a marchand-ébéniste such as Baldock should certainly not be discounted for this medal-casket, with its clever reuse of elements of Boulle's médailler, combined with the more Italiante grandeur of the lapis lazuli panels and the mounts of the frieze and the angles. This is typical of the practices of the period, when pietra dura panels from monumental 17th century cabinets were reused, Boulle marquetry pieces from the Louis XIV period were broken up and the marquetry panels reincorporated into more fashionable, smaller scale pieces and Renaissance hard-stone objects were remounted, while frequently wholly new pieces were created in the antique style.