Beschreibung:

THE WARWICK CEDAR TABLE
A FINE ELIZABETHAN REVIVAL CEDAR CENTRE TABLE
IN THE MANNER OF ANTHONY SALVIN MID-19TH CENTURY
The rectangular top with cut-corners and a boldly beaded border above a frieze carved with lion masks, dolphins and inhabited vine scrolls, fitted with eight drawers, the corners with green man masks, on a square pierced strapwork pedestal and a cruciform base with scrolled and pierced buttresses, the feet modelled as gryphons on gilt iron castors marked PATENT beneath a crown
79cm high, 183cm wide, 148cm deep
 
Provenance:
By repute a gift from the Earls of Warwick to the Legh family for Adlington Hall, Cheshire, and thence by descent.
Literature:
G. Nares, 'Adlington Hall, Cheshire - III: The home of Mrs. Legh', Country Life, 12 December 1952, p. 1961, fig. 3, 'The Mid-Georgian Drawing-room, which lies in the West Front'.
 
Adlington Guide Book: 'In the passage way between the Dining Room and the Great Hall', 'The fine cedar Jacobean revival library table was made from cedar grown at Warwick Castle'.
'The Oak Stairs', Cedar Jacobean revival table known as the 'Warwick Cedar Table'. The shaped square top has an extraordinary beaded border above a strapwork and foliate carved frieze with mask corners. The table is fitted with a drawer on either side on a boss moulded and pierced square pedestal, while the elongated 'X' form supports bold carved with birds, masks and claw feet'.
 
This mid-19th century cedar table is said to be a gift from the Earl of Warwick. It could conceivably have been intended for Warwick Castle, in the Cedar Drawing Room or Great Hall, which were both furnished in the late 19th century in an eclectic Victorian manner with both English and European furniture from the 17th to 19th centuries.
The table is in the French Renaissance style, and relates to 16th century models like the so-called 'Sea-Dog Table', walnut, c. 1570, at Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, which derives from designs by the French architect/draughtsman, Jacques I Androuet du Cerceau (1510-84) (NT 1127744). The elaborately-carved and fantastical 'Sea-Dog Table' is considered one of the best surviving examples of Elizabethan furniture. Similarly to the table offered here with its satyr masks and griffin supports, the 'Sea-Dog Table' features four carved 'sea dog' supports - fantasy creatures with a dog's head, scaly breasts, wings and dolphin tails.
 
19th century furniture in a historicist style was often to the designs of architects such as Anthony Salvin (1799-1881). Salvin was an expert on medieval buildings and gained a reputation for his Tudor-style refurbishment of mansions like Mamhead House, Devon, and Harlaxton Manor, Lincolnshire. He also designed furniture, for example, a suite of bedroom furniture made for Mamhead House including a carved and pierced oak writing table with Tudor ornamentation (V&A W.5:1 to 5-1973), possibly made by G.J. Morant, and, for Scotney Castle, Kent, an oak library table, c. 1844, and an oak half tester bed, the 'Salvin bed' (NT 790860; NT 790972).
Related examples to the table offered here include an octagonal oak table with winged griffin supports in the Small Dining Room, Oxburgh Hall, Norfolk, by Jean Francoise Malfait, the Belgium born cabinet maker and carver known to have supplied furniture to the Bedingfeld family in circa 1850-55. This is part of a collection of oak furniture at Oxburgh Hall by or attributed to Malfait. A further related carved oak library table with dolphin-head feet is at Gawthorpe Hall, Lancashire (NT 421346).