Description:
This joined table is the only known example of a small-sized seventeenth-century table with carved drawer. The drawer is decorated with symetrical vine-foliate relief-carved decoration on punched ground. The flowerheads are accentuated with gouge strikes, and, along with the triangular fields at their bases, are further enhanced with symetrically distributed small cruciform punches in the manner of the Stoughton shop tradition. The lock may be original or an early replacement and the knob is a later replacement. The turnings and foliate-carved decoration of this table relates to foliate-carved case furniture produced in the Connecticut River Valley of western Massachusetts, particularly that associated with the joiner Daniel White, Jr. (1672-1703) of Hatfield. The design of the carving also relates to foliate-carved case furniture produced in the workshop of John Thurston (1607-1685) of Medfield and Dedham, Massachusetts. Originally pegged to the legs, the single-board pine top with thumb-molding on all four sides has been subsequently nailed to the legs and rails. The oak side and rear rails are tenoned to the legs; each joint is secured with two pins. The tops of the turned, columnar oak legs are embellished with collars. The front faces of the blocks above the turnings are decorated with scratch-moldings and the side and rear rails are decorated with channel molding at their midlines and molding at their bottom edges. The oak stretchers are tenoned to the legs; each joint is secured with a single pin. The table lacks rails both above and below the drawer. The drawer supports are fitted into partial grooves in the front and back legs and are nailed to the front legs. The oak drawer sides, grooved to fit over the drawer supports, are nailed into rabbets in the front. The back is butted and nailed to the sides. Three pine boards are lapped together to form the bottom. Their chamfered front edges are nailed into a rabbet in the front and are butted and nailed to the sides and back. The proper right bottom board is replaced.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+2001.12 |
