CIRCA 1500, PROBABLY NORTHERN FRANCE

This impressive oak coffer, the front embellished with elaborate panels of Gothic tracery, represents the last flourishing of the high Gothic style in France from around 1500, before the nascent classical styles of the French Renaissance took hold from the 1530's onwards. Two closely related coffers in oak are in the Musée Cluny, Paris (one from the Sommerard collection, accession number c1.160, one the gift of Gerard in 1879, accession number c1. 9711). A further example was sold from the collection of Baron Cassel van Dorn, Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, 9-10 December 1955, lot 90, while others are illustrated in J. Boccador, Le Mobilier Français du Moyen Age à la Renaissance, Paris, 1988, p. 29 and p. 34.