Lot 253
An important Cape stinkwood, beefwood, ebony and silver-mounted armoire, 18th century
the arched moulded cornice surmounted by foliate cresting, above a pair of panelled doors enclosing a shelf, the lock-plate engraved after the frontis of Archetypa Studiaque Patris, Georgio Hoefnagelii, 1592, the lower half applied with a pair of Cape silver handles above a pair of panelled doors enclosing a shelf, with canted corners carved with ebony panels headed by leaf-cresting, on three massive paw and ball feet, Cape silver mounts by Johan Hendrik Vos, 257cm high, 182cm wide, 52cm deep
Sold for R 800 000
Including Buyer's Premium and VAT R 891 200
Estimate R 800 000 - 1 000 000
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The engraving on the lock-plate of this armoire is copied from the frontis of the influential pattern book and one of the principal sources of seventeenth century still-life painting, Archetypa Studiaque Patris Georgio Hoefnagelii. The work was engraved by Jacob Hoefnagel (1573-1635), court painter to Emperior Rudolph II of Prague from 1602, under the supervision of his father Jours (1542-1601) last of the great Flemish miniaturists and manuscript illluminators.
Stephan Welz, Cape Silver and Silversmiths, Balkema, Cape Town, 1976, page 156, illustration mark 150
