JACOBEAN - FURNITURE AND ENGLISH STYLES IN OAK AND WALNUT BY HELEN CHURCHILL CANDEE AUTHOR OF DECORATIVE STYLES AND PERIODS, THE TAPESTRY BOOK, ETC. WITH FORTY-THREE ILLUSTRATIONS NEW YORK FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY PUBLISHERS Copyright, igj6, by FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY All rights reserved a o o o u CONTEXTS CHAPTEB PAGE I EARLY JACOBEAN STYLES .3 . James I Crowned 1603. II JACOBEAN STYLES TO CHARLES II 14 III THE MIDDLE OF THE CENTURY …… 27 End of the Pure Jacobean. IV CAROLEAN STYLES OR THE RESTORATION … 37 Charles II, 1660 to 1685. V THE END OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY … 48 William and Mary, 1689-1702. ILLUSTRATIONS LATE I The small Jacobean room of elegance and intimacy Frontispiece FACING PAGS II Late Tudor mantel 4 III Late Tudor bed 5 IV Large oak chest 6 V Early Jacobean chest of carved oak … 7 VI Oak chest with drawers, 8 VII Oak stand and marquetry cabinet … 9 VIII Gate-leg table, forming console with gate closed 10 IX Oak chairs H X Oak chest of drawers 12 XI Early Jacobean cabinet 13 XII Oak chairs 16 XIII Spiral turned chair, characteristic of first half of Century 17 XIV Oak cabinet, dated 1653 .20 XV Oak gate-leg dining table 21 XVI Oak day beds 24 XVII Stuart chairs ……… 25 XVIII Marquetry cabinet about 1700 … . . 28 XIX Walnut cabinet 29 XX Stuart settee with carving. Second half of XVII Century 42 ILLUSTRATIONS XXI XXII XXIII XXIV XXV XXVI XXVII XXVIII XXIX XXX XXXI FACING PAGE Charles II chairs in varying styles in carving 43 Walnut sofa 44 Gilt mirror, time of Charles II …. 45 Interesting chair transitional between Stuart styles and William and Mary …. Chairs in variants of William and Mary . Chest of drawers in burr walnut veneer . Smallwalnut table 51 Carved chairs. Period of William and Mary 52 Walnut chairs, William and Mary ., 53 Queen Anne single chair. Queen Anne arm chair. Walnut Queen Anne chairs . . 54 Queen Anne chair 55 48 49 50 JACOBEAN FURNITURE CHAPTER I EARLY JACOBEAN STYLES JAMES I CROWNED 1603 WHEN a passion for collecting antique fur niture first swept America, and prizes were plucked from attics, cellars and old barns, the eagle eye of the amateur sought only those fine pieces that were made in the age of mahogany and satin-wood. Every piece was dubbed Colonial with rash generalisation until the time when a little erudition apportioned the well-made distinctive fur niture to its proper classes. Then every person of culture became expert on eighteenth century furni ture, and the names of Chippendale and his prolific mates fell glibly from all lips. That much accomplished, the collector and home maker then threw an intelligent eye on another page of history and realised that the seventeenth century and certain bits of oak and walnut that had stood neglected, belonged to an equally interesting period of Americas social development. 4 JACOBEAN FURNITURE All at once the word Jacobean was on every tongue, as Colonial had been before. Attics, cel lars and barns were searched again, this time for oak and walnut, not mahogany, and for heavy square construction, not for bandy legs and delicate re straint. It was the marvellous carved chest that first announced itself, and then a six-legged highboy, and the lower part of a thousand-legged table which now we call a gate. These, we said with inspiration, are the gods of the first settlers mahogany is but modern stuff. But this time we were more savant thanbefore, and instead of starving our eager minds on the occa sional resurrected American bit, we went at once to the source, to England, and there found in abundance for the long purse a charming sequence of styles covering all the times of our earlier history as settlers and colonisers. Thus were we able to identify these strange early pieces of our own and to recognise our quarry when found in a dusty corner. That very old pieces still are found, pieces brought over here in the days of their mode, is proved to any collector…
