Christie’s roundel
Lot 326

A PAIR OF MID-VICTORIAN EBONISED AND GILT DECORATED CONSOLE TABLES

WITH DECORATED SLATE TOPS BY G.E. MAGNUS, THIRD QUARTER 19TH CENTURY

Closed30 June 2009

Price Realised

GBP 5,000

More Information

How to sell

A PAIR OF MID-VICTORIAN EBONISED AND GILT DECORATED CONSOLE TABLES
WITH DECORATED SLATE TOPS BY G.E. MAGNUS, THIRD QUARTER 19TH CENTURY
Each with rectangular painted slate top on a pair of waisted anthemion carved and stencil decorated end standards, one of the slate tops marked 'MAGNUS' in red paint to the underside
Each 28. 1/2 in. (72.5 cm.) high; 48 in. (122 cm.) wide; 25 in. (63. 1/2 cm.) deep (2)

Specialist note

G.E.Magnus produced articles of decorated slate in the mid-19th century from their Pimlico wirkshop, exhibiting at the Great Exhibition in 1851.
The tables, with their palm-flowered and sarcophagus-scrolled trestles, evolved in part from the celebrated porphyry bathing vase, known as the sarcophagus of Pope Clement XII , popularised by C. H. Tatham, Etchings Representing the Best Examples of Ancient Ornamental Architecture (1799); and in part by a table pattern in T. Hope, Household Furniture and Interior Decoration, (1807, pl. 12). The London firm of Magnus of Pimlico were exhibitors at the 1851 Great Exhibition, and are celebrated in particular for their embellishment of Thurstons billiard table designed by Prince Albert for Osborne House (see J. Meyer, Great Exhibitions, Woodbridge, 2006, p.40; and English Heritage Osborne House Guide 1989, p.6)).