CIRCA 1780

This table was in the collection of the Cunninghame Graham family; it was possibly acquired by Robert Cunninghame Graham (d. 1797, a Scottish politician and poet, and a close friend of Thomas Sheridan, Charles James Fox and Sir Thomas Dundas (later 1st Baron Dundas). He changed name twice; firstly, under the terms of an entail by which he inherited the Ardoch estate from William Bontine, he took the surname Bontine until his father died. Secondly, in line with the 1709 entail of William 12th Earl of Glencairn, he assumed the name and arms of Cunninghame, in addition to those of Graham, on the death in 1796 of Maj. Gen. John Cunninghame, 15th Earl of Glencairn and last in line. From him Robert inherited the Finlaystone estate, so that he is often known as Robert Cunninghame Graham of Gartmore and Finlaystone. At his death, he was enormously wealthy with estates stretching from Perthshire (Gartmore & Kippen), through Dunbartonshire (Galingad & Ardoch) and across the Clyde to Renfrewshire (Finlaystone); in addition he held the lands of Lochwood in Lanarkshire and owned a Jamaican plantation at Roaring River.
The central painted medallion of this fine neo-classical side table reflects the fashion for jasperware first developed by Josiah Wedgwood in the 1770s, and particularly associated with the neoclassical sculptor and designer John Flaxman Jr., who began to supply Wedgwood with designs from 1775. The scene probably depicts Ceres, in Greek and Roman mythology the goddess of agriculture, and similarly to Bacchus, associated in the 18th century with the dining room.