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Object of the Month: September 2025

Sea Captain’s Chest

Oak, Initialed and Dated: 1614

Dutch, 17th century

The Museum & Gallery’s renowned collection of art reflects timeless Truth communicated over centuries of storytelling by the most notable artists of their day. These artists sought to share transcendent spiritual realities, but each was limited to the historical “palette” available to them—levels of biblical understanding, historical and geographical knowledge, national boundaries and cultural context. While studying the artworks, we also learn of the cultural landscape of their time.

In a way that is unique in the art world, the Museum & Gallery’s important “canvasses” are not just on the walls. The nearly 150 pieces of medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque furniture expand our knowledge of the eras in which they were made and the distinctive purposes for which they were created.

Take for instance this Dutch Sea Captain’s Chest. Made from dense, rot-resistant Northern European oak, constructed with sides that splay outward as they rise toward the domed lid (in order to fit against a ship’s interior hull) and including a second, smaller compartment inside, the chest is bound with thin iron strapwork that serves as structural reinforcement, security, and decorative purposes. Engraved on the substantial lock are the year (1614), month (December) and initials of its maker or owner (CNDE). While most sailors had a small, simple sea chest, a captain’s sea chest would reflect the greater size of his responsibility, his social position, and the types of things that would be needed during an 8–10-month voyage (charts and maps, important trade documents, the sailors’ pay, and personal possessions). Such chests were a necessity, but they also came to be artworks in their own right.

This M&G chest hails from the Dutch Golden Age, which extended from the 17th through the early 18th centuries. This era witnessed an explosion of Dutch arts, trade, wealth and world standing. Rembrandt (1606-1660) and Vermeer (1632-1675) both lived in the 1600s, and they recorded the wealth and complexity of their society. Many of their patrons and subjects were astoundingly wealthy noblemen and merchants. None of this would have been possible without Dutch sea trade and the ships’ captains, who facilitated it.

The main engine of Holland’s wealth and global importance was the Dutch East India Company (or Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, VOC). Founded in 1602 and liquidated in 1795, the VOC was the most significant of the early European trading companies operating in Asia, and a little background is in order.

In 1579 the Treaty of Utrecht united the Low Countries (the seven northern provinces) in their struggle for independence from the Spanish/Hapsburg rule, forming what would become the Republic of the United Netherlands. Even before this union the mariners and merchants of these provinces were the most prolific and successful in the region. In 1599, likely using information gained through espionage, the first Dutch fleet attempted to break Portugal’s monopoly of the Asian spice trade. The endeavor was only mildly successful financially, but it showed what might be done.

By 1602, so many Dutch companies were competing for the spice trade that the price and glut of spices in Europe became an issue. In a single act of fiat, the Dutch government amalgamated these companies into a single entity, the United Dutch East India Company. The government gave the company a monopoly on the spice trade via the Cape of Good Hope, and it would become a behemoth.

By the middle of the 1600s the Dutch East India Company would own 150 ships, have 50,000 employees worldwide, field a private army of 10,000 soldiers, and maintain outposts from the Persian Gulf to Japan. This, the world’s first truly multinational company, had the right to wage war, create new colonies, make treaties, punish and execute criminals, and coin its own money. Between 1602 and 1796—a time when a round-trip voyage from Amsterdam to Jakarta required at least 8-10 months—the Dutch East India Company conducted more than 5,000 voyages between Holland and Asia.

In a single object, M&G’s Dutch Sea Captain’s Chest embodies a Golden Age of art, exploration, and trade.  Similar chests would have been familiar to Rembrandt, Hals and Vermeer, and it’s fitting to have such a chest in the Collection. If we listen, they illumine us about both their own cultural moment and the influence that culture continues to have upon the world as we know it.

 

Dr. Stephen B. Jones, M&G volunteer

 

Resources:

Museum of Western Australia

en.unesco.org

World History Encyclopedia

 

 

Published 2025

 

Object of the Month: September 2025

Sea Captain’s Chest

Oak, Initialed and Dated: 1614

Dutch, 17th century

The Museum & Gallery’s renowned collection of art reflects timeless Truth communicated over centuries of storytelling by the most notable artists of their day. These artists sought to share transcendent spiritual realities, but each was limited to the historical “palette” available to them—levels of biblical understanding, historical and geographical knowledge, national boundaries and cultural context. While studying the artworks, we also learn of the cultural landscape of their time.

In a way that is unique in the art world, the Museum & Gallery’s important “canvasses” are not just on the walls. The nearly 150 pieces of medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque furniture expand our knowledge of the eras in which they were made and the distinctive purposes for which they were created.

Take for instance this Dutch Sea Captain’s Chest. Made from dense, rot-resistant Northern European oak, constructed with sides that splay outward as they rise toward the domed lid (in order to fit against a ship’s interior hull) and including a second, smaller compartment inside, the chest is bound with thin iron strapwork that serves as structural reinforcement, security, and decorative purposes. Engraved on the substantial lock are the year (1614), month (December) and initials of its maker or owner (CNDE). While most sailors had a small, simple sea chest, a captain’s sea chest would reflect the greater size of his responsibility, his social position, and the types of things that would be needed during an 8–10-month voyage (charts and maps, important trade documents, the sailors’ pay, and personal possessions). Such chests were a necessity, but they also came to be artworks in their own right.

This M&G chest hails from the Dutch Golden Age, which extended from the 17th through the early 18th centuries. This era witnessed an explosion of Dutch arts, trade, wealth and world standing. Rembrandt (1606-1660) and Vermeer (1632-1675) both lived in the 1600s, and they recorded the wealth and complexity of their society. Many of their patrons and subjects were astoundingly wealthy noblemen and merchants. None of this would have been possible without Dutch sea trade and the ships’ captains, who facilitated it.

The main engine of Holland’s wealth and global importance was the Dutch East India Company (or Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, VOC). Founded in 1602 and liquidated in 1795, the VOC was the most significant of the early European trading companies operating in Asia, and a little background is in order.

In 1579 the Treaty of Utrecht united the Low Countries (the seven northern provinces) in their struggle for independence from the Spanish/Hapsburg rule, forming what would become the Republic of the United Netherlands. Even before this union the mariners and merchants of these provinces were the most prolific and successful in the region. In 1599, likely using information gained through espionage, the first Dutch fleet attempted to break Portugal’s monopoly of the Asian spice trade. The endeavor was only mildly successful financially, but it showed what might be done.

By 1602, so many Dutch companies were competing for the spice trade that the price and glut of spices in Europe became an issue. In a single act of fiat, the Dutch government amalgamated these companies into a single entity, the United Dutch East India Company. The government gave the company a monopoly on the spice trade via the Cape of Good Hope, and it would become a behemoth.

By the middle of the 1600s the Dutch East India Company would own 150 ships, have 50,000 employees worldwide, field a private army of 10,000 soldiers, and maintain outposts from the Persian Gulf to Japan. This, the world’s first truly multinational company, had the right to wage war, create new colonies, make treaties, punish and execute criminals, and coin its own money. Between 1602 and 1796—a time when a round-trip voyage from Amsterdam to Jakarta required at least 8-10 months—the Dutch East India Company conducted more than 5,000 voyages between Holland and Asia.

In a single object, M&G’s Dutch Sea Captain’s Chest embodies a Golden Age of art, exploration, and trade.  Similar chests would have been familiar to Rembrandt, Hals and Vermeer, and it’s fitting to have such a chest in the Collection. If we listen, they illumine us about both their own cultural moment and the influence that culture continues to have upon the world as we know it.

 

Dr. Stephen B. Jones, M&G volunteer

 

Resources:

Museum of Western Australia

en.unesco.org

World History Encyclopedia

 

 

Published 2025

Object of the Month: November 2023

Cabinet on Stand

Walnut

English, late 17th century

 

This William and Mary Cabinet on Stand came into the Museum & Gallery’s collection in 1970, through the generosity of a prominent Asheville physician, musician, author, and collector of art and antiques, Dr. Charles S. Norburn.  Dr. Norburn served as a Navy surgeon in World War I, then in Navy hospitals in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.  He was even appointed by the U.S. Surgeon General to serve as personal surgeon to President Warren Harding on a trip to Alaska. After leaving the Navy, Norburn returned to North Carolina in 1923 and established the cutting-edge Norburn Hospital Clinic in 1928. The Norburn Hospital’s second building, with 32 acres of property, stood on what is now part of the Mission Health campus, leaving a lasting legacy of care in Western North Carolina. His donation to M&G has left a lasting cultural legacy in the western Carolinas, as well.

Much from the period of William and Mary (1689-1702), including the furniture characteristic of that era, reflects the religious atmosphere of the day. While it would oversimplify the case to say that religion was the sole explanation for the furniture fashion of the day, most sources do note the significant influence religion had upon it. Indeed, there would not have been a “William and Mary” period, had it not been for the “Glorious Revolution” of 1688, which deposed James II from the English throne and made him notable for being the last Roman Catholic monarch of England.

James II had succeeded his elder brother, Charles II in 1685, when Charles died without a legitimate heir. Early in his reign, Charles II had urged his younger brother to rear his daughters as Protestants, despite the fact that James and his wife were Catholic. Thus, when Charles II died, the throne passed to James II and established his elder daughter, Mary (b. 1662), as heir apparent. Mary had married her cousin, William of Orange, in 1677, when she was just 15, and moved to the Protestant Netherlands with her husband.

From the start, James II’s overt Catholicism alienated the majority in England. That dissatisfaction was amplified in 1688 with two crises—the birth of a son to James, (raising fears of a Roman Catholic dynasty), and very public conflicts with the king over religious tolerance.

Seven highly placed Englishmen (an Anglican bishop and six prominent politicians) wrote to William of Orange, inviting him to come set right the country’s grievances. William sailed to England in November of 1688 with a force of 20,000 men, making his way to London with very little opposition. James II fled to France in December of that year, and Parliament—now cemented as the ruling body in England—pronounced William III and Mary II joint rulers in April 1689.

The “William and Mary style” developed within this religious and cultural milieu. With them, William and Mary brought Dutch craftsmen to England, popularizing a style that had first been seen under Charles II (1660-1685) throughout England and its colonies. The finely inlaid cabinet style of this era had originated in France, but some of the most influential craftsmen were Huguenots. These weavers, painters, joiners and carvers fled to England from France in order to escape the religious persecution that arose after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685). Their influence resulted in a more staid style than the flamboyance of Louis XIV’s court, while still exhibiting the highest craftsmanship and newest fabrication techniques.

The Museum & Gallery’s Cabinet on Stand evidences the traits distinctive to fine cabinetmaking in the William and Mary style. In place of the heavy, horizontal lines of domestic furniture, there was an emphasis on verticality, lifting cabinets on multiple, finely turned or barley-twisted legs. Indeed, the “high boy” and other specialized forms of domestic furniture owe their inception to William and Mary design.

Overall, there was a movement away from the excessive grandeur of the French court and the English Restoration period, but there was also intricacy and high design. Thin slices of highly figured woods (sometimes acacia, olive, or other exotic woods made possible by new East-West trade routes), ivory, and metal were affixed to flat surfaces like cabinet doors and sides, creating contrasting colors for geometric shapes, flowers, birds, and numerous other natural themes. Beneath these veneers, walnut superseded oak as the most frequently used wood species. Atop the veneers, surface treatments like lacquer and other fine polishes became vital to protect and highlight the designs.

In keeping with the above-mentioned traits of William and Mary cabinetmaking, M&G’s Cabinet on Stand features detailed walnut burl veneers and geometric maple inlay on three sides, over a yellow pine substrate.  An overhanging cornice rests at the very top, with two drawers and two flush, side-hinged doors beneath.  This top portion (the “cabinet” in the designation “cabinet-on-stand”) sits on a base containing two additional drawers and four sophisticated, tapering barley-twist front legs and three simpler turned rear legs. The barley-twist legs taper from being thinner at top and bottom to thick in the middle and demonstrate the cabinetmaker’s skill. A flat display platform sits at the very bottom, raised from the floor on turned bun feet.

Our cabinet is likely from the late 17th century or early 18th century (perhaps 1700-1725) and illustrates the departure from the continental style toward a more staid English and/or Protestant sensibility. It is a presentation cabinet that served for storage in some prominent place of a household, possibly holding linens in the 17th-century equivalent of a dining room. The top and base are flat for display and may have held Dutch majolica, other pottery, or even items from the Orient over the years, depending on the wealth of the owner.  This Cabinet on Stand is an important piece in the M&G collection for the history and artistry it brings to life.

 

Dr. Stephen B. Jones, volunteer

 

Sources:

David L’eglise, Village Antiques at Biltmore, Asheville, NC

Joseph Aronson, The Encyclopedia of Furniture

Judith Miller, Furniture

Judith Miller, Miller’s Antiques Encyclopedia

Encyclopaedia Britannica

MetMuseum.org

Tim Forrest, The Bulfinch Anatomy of Antique Furniture

Kay West, “Daughter publishes book by pioneering physician father decades after his death”

 

Object of the Month: May 2023

Cassone

Walnut and pastiglia

Italian, 15th century

The antique furnishings in the Museum & Gallery collection elevate each visitor’s experience of the artwork on the walls, but the pieces also provide a historical context of the eras and cultures from which the artworks sprang. Indeed, the furnishings are also artworks in themselves.

This is certainly true of the many cassoni (plural of the Italian term for “chests”) in the collection. Like other furnishings in Renaissance homes, the quality of workmanship and materials employed in decorating each cassone convey a great deal about the fashion of their times, the technologies available to craftsmen, and the wealth and social status of their owners.

Unfortunately, much has gone against their survival to our day. Cassoni were used for storage of personal items, opened and closed numerous times over the years. That wear, along with the environment in a home, infestations of termites, dry rot, changes in taste and reversals of family fortunes all conspire against the preservation of these furnishings.

These rich, showy Italian types of chests became widespread in Northern and Central Italy, particularly Tuscany (with a number of the best artists hailing from the cities of Siena and Florence). Weddings served as the occasions for which cassoni were made, and they were in fashion from the 14th-16th centuries, a period spanning the very late-Middle Ages to the beginning and middle of the Renaissance. The oldest surviving cassoni feature primitive panel designs, while later works demonstrate lavish carving, gilding, polychrome, and more complex narrative scenes.

Much like moving trucks, boxes, and barrels accompanying the establishment of new homes, cassoni had a very specific use. Practically speaking, the chests were designed to contain the bride’s dowry and jewels, her family’s contribution to the marriage, and became one of the couple’s most important household furnishings—often at the foot of the bed. They quite literally became a vehicle displaying the status, wealth and sophistication of the intermarrying families, carried in a procession (the domum ductio) from the bride’s parent’s home to her groom’s abode.

Decoratively speaking, cassoni often feature heraldic imagery relating to the families’ crests, and the pictorial panels often contained biblical, mythological, or allegorical imagery which ranged from learned and literary to humorous and light-hearted. Cassoni themselves were so common in the early- and middle-Renaissance that they’re included in Old Master paintings (most familiar may be scenes of the Annunciation in which Mary is seated on or kneeling near a cassone situated at the foot of her curtained bed) and even picture-within-picture vignettes on cassoni panels themselves.

This particular M&G cassone entered the collection in 1957, and its features suggest a date very early after 1400, likely from Tuscany. Unlike many cassoni today, which have the panels removed and presented as separate works of art in their own right, our chest is in good original condition and is structurally sound, despite surviving 600 years of use and change. The lid is still attached with its original hinges and has a simple locking mechanism. While the lid opens and closes easily, the tight fit and years of use have worn off some of the gesso along the top edge.

Composed of thick walnut planks and framing, the chest has a large front center panel decorated with gilt and polychrome over trellis-embossed gesso. Heraldic lions (possibly leopards or even hunting dogs) face each other across the front, and the two vertical end panels blossom with delicate arabesques and outline colored shields, which likely contained familial coats of arms.

Carved, fluted pilasters frame the two pictorial end panels and are topped with vague Corinthian capitals. The primitive-style narrative at the right end is now entirely obscured, but the imagery at the opposite end remains. The subject matter is indistinct and may be biblical or mythological. Most likely, perhaps, it is the myth of Diana (Artemis) and Actaeon, from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, in which the bathing goddess is startled by a young hunter. In her anger, Diana turns Actaeon into a stag who is then hunted and killed by his own hounds. This identification seems to make sense of the simplistic representation of forest, pool, a stag’s head (lower right) and a hound in the left background. As an allegory or fable for a young couple, it may emphasize modesty, self control, and consequences for the lack of either or both.

This cassone provides insight into the artistry, fashion, and domestic life of those living in the early years of the Italian Renaissance and is a valuable part of the M&G collection.

 

Dr. Stephen B. Jones, M&G volunteer

 

 

Additional Resources:

The Oxford History of Western Art.  Kemp, Martin, ed.  Oxford University Press, 2000.

Pooley, Eugene.  “Scenes from a Marriage.”

https://blog.dorotheum.com/en/classic-week-florentine-school/

https://www.medieval.eu/bridal-chests-or-cassoni-from-medieval-italy/

 

 

Published 2023

Object of the Month: October 2022

Cabinet on Stand

White Oak with Ivory and Ebony

Italian, 17th or 18th century

Donated to the Museum & Gallery in 1973, this beautiful antique was described merely as a “Chest of Drawers,” believed to be Dutch, from the late 16th century. During the cabinet’s history in the collection, the mirrored base on which it was first displayed was swapped out for the more suitable, baluster-turned legs on which it currently stands (though not original).

The Cabinet is substantial, standing five-and-a-half feet tall (including the base), almost four feet wide, and 15 inches deep. Beyond that, not much has been known about the Cabinet beyond its style (Baroque) and composition (finely detailed ebony and inlaid ivory veneers on the face of oak drawers and doors). Three etched ivory plaques, possibly based on engravings, grace the front of the piece. These picture the Apostle John on the left lower door and John the Baptist on the right. Both doors are lockable with the original key. The central, etched ivory plaque depicts Mary, the mother of Christ, framed by three-dimensional carved ivory columns to either side.

While those details of the Cabinet are basic, they communicate a significant amount about the furniture’s place and date of origin, as well as the type of owner it was likely built for. First, however, it’s helpful to know some of the history of cabinets as furniture.

Cabinets utilizing ebony wood date back at least to Egyptian times, like several discovered in Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922. Such dedicated, highly decorated storage furniture demonstrated the status and wealth of its owner. Over intervening centuries of adaptation, storage and collection cabinets proliferated in both Eastern and Western cultures, though only the wealthy could afford the most finely constructed and exotically decorated pieces.

Ebony wood was a favorite material, sourced only from ebony tree varieties in western Africa, India, and Indonesia.  Because ebony was scarce, craftsmen learned to shave and apply thin veneers of the jet-black ebony heartwood on top of readily-available wood species used for the rest of the object. The dark background was then inlaid with contrasting materials such as ivory, metal, lighter woods or semiprecious stone.

As early as 1566, the inventory of a room in the Ducal Palace of Mantua (in northern Italy) lists an ebony cabinet with inlaid ivory panels. Though the Ducal version was likely made 150-plus years prior to M&G’s Cabinet (dating sometime in the late-17th or early 18th century), both share similar intricate ivory inlay and metal filigree.

Piecing together that general history helps in suggesting the origins and ownership of M&G’s Cabinet on Stand The condition of the ivory and construction methods distance the cabinet from the 19th-century revival of ebony and ivory furnishings.

However, the ivory demonstrates some discoloration and shrinkage from age, while the cabinet frame, back, and drawer construction seem more consistent with an earlier date. The white oak used as the secondary wood was common only in northern Italy (Venice or Milan, but not Rome) and Northern Europe (German, Holland, and Flanders).

The etched biblical figures expressed in the inlaid ivory seem more “lively” and less restrained than is common when artists in Protestant countries present the same figures. That suggests a Roman Catholic country of origin, such as Italy.

Finally, the totality of the Cabinet—exotic materials, time-consuming craftsmanship, and subject matter—indicate a prominent and wealthy patron. The religious subject matter likely indicates that the original owner was a highly-placed churchman, perhaps a bishop, using the cabinet as a way to flaunt both his religious devotion and his prominence/wealth.

Good examples of similarly inlaid antique chests exist. Some of the best examples can be found in the collections of the Victoria & Albert Museum (dating from about 1600), the Museum fur Kunst & Gewerbe (Hamburg, Germany), and some auction sites such as Sotheby’s and Christie’s, as well as high-end antique dealers.

 

Dr. Stephen Jones, M&G volunteer

Resources

David L’Eglise, partner at Village Antiques at Biltmore

Sotheby’s

Anticstore.art 

1st Dibs

Antiques-Atlas 

Amherst.edu  

French Accents

 

Published 2022

Object of the Month: September 2021

Prie Dieux

Walnut

16th century, Italian

When one thinks of prayer, furniture is not usually the first thing to come to mind. In Matthew 6:5-6, Christ encouraged making requests in prayer privately, rather than praying to be noticed publicly. However, a common piece of furniture constructed for the purpose of prayer was manufactured during the Renaissance and is still being made today. It is known as a prie-dieu, derived from French for “praying to God.” This special furnishing serves the same purpose as a prayer desk and a prayer chair.

M&G currently has two prie-dieux in its collection. These may have been used in a church, cathedral, or even a home. As a common piece of liturgical furniture in the Roman Catholic Church, they are still in use for worship, weddings, and funerals. When President Kennedy was lying in state, prie-dieux were in the same room.

Both of M&G’s Prie Dieux are from Italy, dating to the early Renaissance in the late 15th to mid-16th centuries.  Ornately carved walnut adds to the richness of their finish. One has a hinged kneeler with a raised panel door in the middle and a small drawer at the top. The other’s “lectern top” sits on “two powerful scroll consoles edged with gouge carving in a scale effect; the base terminates in small posts with pine-cone finials.” However, “the most striking feature is the festoon suspended from the top” with “fruit-and-leaf forms enclosing a winged angel head.”

Additionally, two paintings in M&G’s collection include prie-dieux. Both pictures highlight the importance of the Annunciation. The archangel Gabriel came to Mary to inform her that she had found grace in the sight of God. She would be privileged to bear the long-awaited Messiah, Jesus Christ. Christ Himself would become the only means of access to God the Father—through prayer. As explained in I Timothy 2:5-6, this direct access was accomplished through His passion and resurrection, which is symbolized by an open door on the prie-dieu. Fellowship with God in heaven is available to all people.

St. Gabriel the Archangel and The Virgin Annunciate by Venetian Reniassance painter, Francesco Montemezzano, were formerly one complete canvas (with one other M&G painting of God the Father depicted with a group of angels). These works were separated into three sections, which are all in M&G’s collection. The artist depicts Mary kneeling at her prie-dieu as she converses with Gabriel, who is seen on the opposite canvas.

The Altar Wings with Scenes from the Birth of Christ was created by an unknown Netherlandish artist. These wood panel paintings were completed during the same century as the Montemezzano canvases—roughly mid to late 1500s. Once the hinged doors of a larger altarpiece, these special panels hid the interior artistic scenes, which would be opened for special services or events. The interior paintings were in vivid color; however, the exterior doors like these were usually painted in gray tones, known as grisaille. This technique suggested a sculptural effect. Gabriel the archangel is positioned on the left panel facing Mary on the right. Mary is depicted with a lily (symbolic of her purity and Christ’s future resurrection) and a prie-dieu (on the far-right edge).

Prie-dieux are found in museum collections around the world—both as furniture and within the pictorial settings of Old Master paintings. London’s Victoria and Albert Museum has a prie-dieu closely resembling one of M&G’s. The National Gallery’s Venetian Annunciation depicts Mary sitting at a prie-dieu.

Prayer is more often discussed than practiced. Fortunately, the opportunity exists for not only God’s children to approach their Heavenly Father, but anyone seeking His help—with or without a prie-dieu.

 

John Good, Security Manager

 

Published 2021

 

Further Resources:

Aronson, Joseph, Furniture in the Bob Jones University Collection

Hiebert, D. Edmond, Working With God Through Prayer

 

Object of the Month: August 2020

Seat of State

Walnut

Italian, 16th century

A throne is usually a large, ornate chair designed to impress. The majesty and power of the one seated on the throne is visually communicated by the throne’s magnificence. Thrones are also designed to intimidate the one who stands, kneels or bows before the one seated upon it. Today the judge’s bench of a courtroom and the dais of an assemblies’ chairman are designed to have a similar effect.

Technically a high backed, multi-seat bench is a settle. Settles generally have arms, and elaborate ones often have canopies. They are generally stationary and may be an architectural feature built into a room. A settee is the settle’s smaller, movable cousin. Today’s couch, sofa or love seat can be called a settee.

In the 15th and 16th centuries various kinds of settles were used in Italian city-states for ceremonial purposes.  In the Chamber of the Great Council of the Doge’s Palace in Venice, massive, built-in settles surround the room. Along the front wall is a raised seven-seat settle for officials of the Maggior Consiglio. The central, larger, higher seat was for the Doge.

The three seat Throne of Giuliano Dei Medici (son of Lorenzo the Magnificent) is very similar to M&G’s Seat of State. Although the provenance of Giuliano’s throne is not clear, most likely it originated in Florence. Another elaborate three-seat throne, attributed to Bartolomeo Baglioni, was probably made in the early 1500s for the Strozzi family of Venice (now currently in the Ringling Museum).

Other than the Seat of State being crafted in Italy in the 16th century, its origin is unknown. But similarity to these and other examples, give credence to it having served as the ceremonial seat of an Italian, high-ranking, three-person governmental body.

M&G’s Seat of State lacks features that would associate it with a particular city or individual. The rich profusion of intricate carvings reflects scrolling foliage, mythical beings, grotesque masks and geometric embellishments. There are small crests, but they appear to be stylized ornaments rather than official symbols.  Also, they are not located in prominent places where identifying crests could be recognized and appreciated by those in front of the settle.

The stylized crests are not in the prominent places where one would expect to find official crests (center image). Highly skilled craftsmen embellished M&G’s massive settle with ornate details (left-right images).

The choir stall, also represented in M&G’s furniture collection, is similar to a settle. Choir stalls generally have uniform, narrow seats. Their high backs and canopies are more for acoustics and aesthetics of the room than aggrandizement of the individuals seated on them. Choir stall seats are often collapsible, permitting the choir to stand or kneel during religious services. The visible carvings of a choir stall generally have religious themes with geometric ornamentation.

The Seat of State is constructed of interlocking pieces of solid walnut fitted together with mortise and tenon joints. The seat is a chest, and each person sits on a hinged lid. Because of the height and depth of the seat, unless you have long legs, you must sit forward on the bench, which makes the back too far away to rest comfortably. The settle’s lack of comfort might have helped to keep ceremonies and meetings short.

Standing in front of M&G’s 10’ high, ornately carved, polished red-brown Seat of State one is impressed with its magnificence. Now, envision being led into that position while three officials in their elaborate ceremonial garb sat on those seats and stared down at you. Will they grant your petition? Will they decide in your favor?  Whatever they do, you just know they have the power and authority to do it.

It worked. That is exactly what this settle was to settle in your mind.

William Pinkston, retired educator and M&G volunteer

 

Published in 2020

Cassone: Renaissance Marriage Chest

The European furniture in the Museum & Gallery collection has been called the finest in America by Joseph Aronson, author of The Encyclopedia of Furniture. This beautiful Italian cassone is a good example.

Object of the Month: February 2020

Savonarola Chair

Walnut

Florentine, early 16th century 

 

For a mundane piece of furniture with such a simplistic design as to be easily transportable, this folding chair bears the name of a big personality and has allowed countless VIPs to rest and rule simultaneously.

Girolamo Savonarola was a monk and religious reformer in Florence, Italy. He came to the Medici’s city in 1481 to serve at the Dominican monastery and church of San Marco (St. Mark).  He proved to be honest and sincere, and he studied and memorized Scripture, which he applied practically to everyday living for himself and in his teaching. His preaching was passionate and dramatic, and he spoke against corruption in the church and papacy. His influence for morality and reform held popular support for a while, even garnering respect from Lorenzo, the Magnificent. Eventually, however, Savonarola was bitterly opposed by Rome. The pope enforced excommunication, suspension of the sacraments from the faithful, and a ban of trade, which affected Florence’s prosperous economy. Ultimately, the Florentines turned on him too, and Savonarola was sentenced to death. He was hanged and his body burned in the town square in 1498—just seventeen years after his arrival.

Shaped in the frame of an X, this Italian Renaissance Savonarola Chair is one of a few in M&G’s collection. The chair is constructed of walnut and is considered “unusual” by furniture expert Joseph Aronson because it only has five pairs of the thick, pivoted S-shaped strips of wood to hold the hinged seat. Normally, a chair like this might have six, eight, or even twelve pairs. However, these five rung pairs are each held together at the floor with a trestle for sturdiness, and the pairs are joined at the top by heavy arms with carved rosettes. The back of the chair is a modest board, which is attached loosely—easily removed when the chair needs to be folded. 

The chair style has had many names through the centuries and geographical regions including the X-chair, curule, faldstool, scissors chair, Dante chair, and Luther chair. Because of its unique design, the chair traces its roots and practical service back to antiquity. A visual record exists of Egyptian Pharoah Tut’ankhamun sitting in the chair. Roman senators and consuls used a backless version of these portable seats, and in Romanesque and Gothic illuminations the kings of France are perched on it.  

With Italy’s interest in Greek and Roman culture and thought, the Renaissance also revived awareness in the architecture and design from antiquity including furniture. One writer explains the era as “an exhibition of emancipated modern genius fired and illuminated by the masterpieces of the past.” During the awakening, the chair’s status of power continues in the pictorial records of seated bishops, emperors, and popes. Artists also rendered respected religious individuals in the chair such as St. Ambrose and Christ’s mother Mary. 

The Museum of San Marco preserves and features the fifteenth-century Dominican monastery where Fra Angelico was Prior and who decorated many of the monk’s cells and interior spaces with beautiful frescoes. Girolamo Savonarola became the monastery’s Prior in 1491 and occupied three cells that today still display a few of his personal items, including a folding X-chair in his study and similar chairs in other parts of the museum.

However, it wasn’t until nearly 400 years after his torturous death that the chair became associated with Savonarola specifically. In 1878, Florentine sculptor Giovanni Biggi created for the church at San Marco a bronze statue of the monk sitting pensively in an X-shaped chair.

Erin R. Jones, Executive Director

 

Additional Reading: 

Furniture of the Italian Renaissance, Walter A. Dyer

Michelangelo and Seats of Power, Eric Denker and William E. Wallace

Faith of Our Fathers: Scenes from Church History, edited by Mark Sidwell

Anatomy of A Design Classic: The Savonarola Chair

 

Published in 2020

Object of the Month: November 2019

Schrank

Walnut and pine

German, 17th century

Storage has been one of humanity’s challenges through the ages.  “Where do I put this?” is a question many of us may ask numerous times a day.  In the digital world it can be more challenging: “Which folder do I store this in?”

The schrank is an evolution of the storage chests from the Middle Ages. When it was discovered that chests placed on top of each other with front-opening doors were more useful, the schrank in miniature was introduced. At that time, it was called a cupboard. Later modifications of enlarging them gave us what is commonly called an armoire, which normally contained more compartments in the top section than a schrank.  

For practical purposes, both the schrank and armoire are used for storage, and the word is used interchangeably by many people. However, the difference between the two is more technical and geographical. Initially used to store armor, the French named the cabinet an armoire. The schrank  was so named by the Germans. The term is still part of several words used to describe a storage item, most notably a kuhlschrank or what is known to us Americans as a refrigerator. 

M&G’s Schrank joined the collection in 1964. It may have originated in southern Germany and was constructed in the 17th century or later.  The last owner prior to M&G was A. S. W. Rosenbach, an antique book collector and dealer living in Philadelphia during the last half of the 19th century into the mid-20th century. His aggressive skill and vast knowledge of books made him “The Terror of the Auction Room.”

The Schrank’s upper carcass is constructed with a single pine board for each side, top, and bottom. The lower carcass uses a single pine board for each side as well as the back and bottom—the lower portion doesn’t need a top since the upper section rests on it. Finely detailed, hand-sawn dovetail joints can be seen on the top of the upper carcass. Carved walnut is used for the decorative ornamentation for the front.

The left door panel displays a common 17th-century scene of Michael the Archangel overcoming Satan, in the form of a dragon. The other door depicts the apocryphal characters of the archangel Raphael with Tobias. The Book of Tobit from the Apocrypha gives detail to the legend presented. Other aspects of the ornamentation have been described in technical terms by Joseph Aronson in his catalog Furniture in the Bob Jones Collection. “The base cupboard features low doors paneled with wave-mouldings framing lion-heads, and its corners are embellished with panels framing scrolls. The astragal is a caryatid figure like the upper. The base mold, like the other horizontals, is quiet and rests on bun feet.”

Though the original craftsman is unknown, this piece of furniture represents well the skilled carving and furniture making from an era that no longer exists. Considering this Schrank was also part of a well-known bibliophile’s furnishings adds intrigue as to what treasures it may have stored more than a century ago.

John Good, Security Manager

 

Published in 2019

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