17TH CENTURY

A distinguishing and very rare feature of the present table is the huanghuali top. Due to the heavy use of these portable, lighter weight tables, more durable materials such as stone or less luxurious woods were often used as work surfaces. Woodblock prints depict tables of this size and proportion used in daily activities, such as for writing, displaying objects, and dining. See, a smaller serpentine-inlaid huanghuali wine table illustrated by Wang Shixiang and Curtis Evarts, Masterpieces from the Museum of Classical Chinese Furniture, Chicago and San Francisco, 1995, pp. 94-95, no. 44. The presence of a huanghuali top suggests the wealth and importance of the gentleman who commissioned the table.

In Connoisseurship of Chinese Furniture: Ming and Early Qing Dynasties, vol. II, Hong Kong, 1990, p. 77. no B34, Wang Shixiang illustrates a wine table of smaller proportions with square-section, beaded legs. The author also discusses the form, and its variants, ibid., vol. I, pp. 54-6.