A VERY FINE LOUIS XVI ENAMEL AND GOLD SNUFF-BOX

BY NICOLAS MENIÈRE, MARKED, PARIS, 1774/1775, WITH THE CHARGE MARK OF JULIEN ALATERRE AND THE DISCHARGE MARK OF JEAN-BAPTISTE FOUACHE AND A LATER DUTCH IMPORTATION MARK

细节

A VERY FINE LOUIS XVI ENAMEL AND GOLD SNUFF-BOX
by Nicolas Menière, marked, Paris, 1774/1775, with the charge mark of Julien Alaterre and the discharge mark of Jean-Baptiste Fouache and a later Dutch importation mark
Octagonal box, the cover, four sides and four canted corners and base enamelled in translucent grey-blue on a vertical coin pattern, within a cagework mount of burnished gold bands applied with translucent green enamelled foliage and chased scrolls, the eight side pilasters chased with fluted Ionic columns entwined with garlands of leaves, the cover centred with an oval enamel miniature painted with a theatrical scene after Louis Carrogis de Carmontelle, within a green enamelled stylized leaf border, the four side panels inset with similarly framed oval enamel panels painted with love symbols
82 mm. (3.1/4 in.) wide

来源

Baron Mayer Carl de Rothschild (1820-1886).
Baron Henri de Rothschild (1872-1946).
S. Bulgari.

出版

H. G. Bunke, Dosen - Ein Brevier, Brunswick, 1960, p. 10, illustrated p. 11.
Jörg Nimmergut and Anna-Maria Wager, Miniaturen · Dosen, Munich, 1982, illustrated p. 64.

拍品专文

Nicolas Menière struck his mark in 1758, cautioned by Claude Michel Filassier. He was the father of the famous Paul-Nicolas Menière, crown jeweller of King Louis XVI.
According to Serge Grandjean (Les tabatières du musée du Louvre, Paris, 1981, p. 132, no. 157), the box in the Louvre dated 1773/1774 and - erroneously - the box from the Sydney Lamon Collection (by Paul-Nicolas Menière, dated 1776/1777, sold Christie's, London, 28 November 1973, lot 25) appeared to be the only boxes by Nicolas Menière to have survived.