FURNITURE, WORKS OF ART & CLOCKS

Now accepting consignments for the 1st July sale.

OPPOSITE. One of a pair of Louis XVI marble and ormolu mounted vases after the Borghese Vase, 44.5cm high. Provenance: Alfred de Rothschild (1842-1918), Lionel de Rothschild (1882-1942), Edmund de Rothschild (1916-2009), The Trustees of Exbury House. Estimate: £20,000 – 30,000

1. A rare pair of 18th century and later Continental silver-gilt models of an elephant and rhinoceros with riders, 36.2cm high. Provenance: Alfred de Rothschild (1842-1918), Lionel de Rothschild (1882-1942), Edmund de Rothschild (1916-2009), The Trustees of Exbury House. Estimate: £10,000 – 15,000

3. A set of eight French giltwood fauteuils with 18th century Beauvais tapestry seats after Fontaine’s Fables, 93cm high. Provenance: Alfred de Rothschild (1842-1918), Lionel de Rothschild (1882-1942), Edmund de Rothschild (1916-2009), The Trustees of Exbury House. Estimate: £8,000 – 12,000

Our 1st April auction will feature eighteen lots from the Rothschild family of Exbury House. Included in the sale are a number of pieces that were originally in the collection of Alfred de Rothschild (1842-1918) of Halton House, the highlight of which is a rare pair of Louis XVI white marble and gilt bronze mounted vases after the Borghese Vase.

The Borghese Vase is a monumental bell-shaped kylix sculpted from Pentelic marble. It was made in the second half of the 1st century BC in Greece as a lavish garden ornament for the Roman market. The vase was discovered in 1566 in the gardens of Sallust in Rome together with a Silenus with Infant Bacchus and, by 1645, the vase was in the Borghese Villa. On the 27th September 1807 it was acquired by Napoleon Bonaparte and was sent to Paris and placed in the Louvre, where it has remained since 1811. It is one of the most influential and admired Greek sculptural vases and was frequently copied in the 18th century with bronze reductions by Zoffoli and Righetti, and other examples produced by Wedgwood and Coade.

The present vases, with their finely sculpted frieze, copy the original closely with their depiction of Bacchanalian revelry and Dionysus supporting a drunken Silenus; however the handles and leaf decoration follow the Medici vase more than the Borghese. They were considered an important part of Alfred’s collection of art and antiques as they feature in Charles Davis’ 1884 publication ‘A Description of the works of art forming the collection of Alfred de Rothschild’. Other items originally in Alfred’s collection that feature in the auction are a pair of silver gilt models of an elephant and rhinoceros with riders, a set of eight giltwood fauteuils in the Louis XVI style with 18th century Beauvais tapestry covers, a lapis lazuli tazza and a Meissen porcelain and ormolu mantel clock. 1 2

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