.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
A very similar casket, on nearly identical feet, was in the collection of Baroness James de Rothschild (E. A. Jones, Objects in Gold and Silver and Limoges Enamel in the Collection of the Baroness James de Rothschild, London, 1912, pp. 20-21). Besides that example Jones records two others, one in the Green vaults in Dresden (J. L. Sponsel, Das Grüne Gewölbe zu Dresden, Leipzig, 1925, p. 126) and one formerly in the collection of S. Marie de Belem and, recorded to be in the collection of the Academy of Fine Art, Lisbon in 1912. Jones notes a further casket of the same form which was in the possession of the church of S. Michael in Munich and published by Leopold Gmelin in Der verlorne Kirchenschatz der Michaels Hofkirche in München, 1880.
Though larger than the present example, the Rothschild and Dresden examples are raised on very similar cast lion feet and have silver plaques set within gilt-copper Corinthian columns on which is applied a cast figure. Each also have acid etched decoration, the design of which can be compared to the Moriskhe and Turckischer designs of Virgil Solis (see for example the exhibition catalogue for Wenzel Jamnitzer und die Nurnberger Goldschmiedekunst 1500-1700, Munich, 1985, nos. 355, 356 and 358).
Though larger than the present example, the Rothschild and Dresden examples are raised on very similar cast lion feet and have silver plaques set within gilt-copper Corinthian columns on which is applied a cast figure. Each also have acid etched decoration, the design of which can be compared to the Moriskhe and Turckischer designs of Virgil Solis (see for example the exhibition catalogue for Wenzel Jamnitzer und die Nurnberger Goldschmiedekunst 1500-1700, Munich, 1985, nos. 355, 356 and 358).