Details
LA FONTAINE DE TABLE DE BODENDICK
FONTAINE DE TABLE EN ARGENT ET VERMEIL
PAR EVERT KETTWYCK, HAMBOURG, 1628-1643, SON POINCON D'ESSAYEUR (1628-1643)
Sur base quadrilobée fondue de dauphins, le réservoir sphérique gravé d'une inscription, la fontaine formée de quatre femmes personnifiant les éléments et centrées d'une colonne à chapiteau corinthien entourée d'un pampre de vigne peint en vert, les réceptacles en forme de coquille, la prise en sphère surmontée d'une nymphe, poinçons sur la base et sur les coquilles
Hauteur : 56,5 cm. (22¼ in.)
Poids brut : 3184 gr. (112.30 oz.)
Provenance
Georg-Wilhelm, duc de Calenberg puis de Lunebourg-Celle (1624-1705).
Par descendance dans la famille royale de Hanovre.
Galerie J. Kugel, Paris.
Literature
Dans l'inventaire des Hanovre de 1747, p. 125, référencée séparement:
1 grooved beaker like a fountain-piece beneath the foot engraved Ambt Boendieck hallmark of Bodendieck
13 (marks) 4 (ounces) 1/2 (lot)
Répertoriée dans le M. Rosenberg, op.cit., vol. II, no. 2383 c), dans les collections du Herzog von Cumberland à Vienne.
Répertoriée dans le Scheffler, Goldschmiede Niedersachen I, Berlin, 1965, p. 422, no. 842 b).
H. Grandsart, "Les coupes des Hanovre", Connaissance des arts, 2006, numéro 634, illustr. p.6.
Exhibited
Goldschmiede-Austellung, Wien-Penzing, 1889, no. 252.
Engraved
L'inscription sur le réservoir est "AMBT BODENDICK" qui signifie approximativement district de Bodendick (aujourd'hui Bodenteich).
Special Notice
No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT payable at 19.6% (5.5% for books) will be added to the buyer’s premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis
Further Details
THE BODENDICK TABLE-FOUNTAIN
A RARE GERMAN PARCEL-GILT TABLE-FOUNTAIN
MAKER'S MARK OF EVERT KETTWYCK, HAMBURG, CIRCA 1630, AND WITH HIS ASSAYMASTER'S MARK (1628-1643)
Cast with four dolphins supporting the plain spherical reservoir engraved with inscription, with four shell-shaped dishes above, the corinthian column stem flanked by four allegorical female figures of the Elements and partly enclosed by vine tendral with cold-painted green leaves, the spherical knop above capped by a seated nymph with pipe, marked on base and on shells
The inscription reads 'AMBT BODENDICK' which loosely translates as District of Bodendick.
Table fountains were often monumental structures and as such were a source of entertainment and wonder to visitors. However their function, if they were to be used at all, was to be either for pouring wine or, perhaps more likely, to be filled with rosewater to rinse the hands.
Very few examples have survived, but the most dramatic is that dated 1648 now in the Rosenborg Castle in Copenhagen, made in part by Hans III Peters in Augsburg and by an unidentified maker believed to be from Hamburg. This was made to celebrate the coronation of King Frederick III in 1648, five years after his marriage to Sophia-Amelia Brunswick-Lüneburg. (See L. Seelig, Silber und Gold, Augsburger Goldschmiedekunst für die Höfe Europas, Munich, 1994, p. 267, no. 63).
A second example, also larger and dated 1649-1652, was made in Hamburg by Peter I Ohr, and was a gift from King Charles XI of Sweden in 1662 to the Emperor Alexis Michaelovich and is now in the Armoury Museum, the Kremlin, Moscow (see B.Shifman and G. Watson, eds. Gifts to the Tsars 1500-1700, New York, 2001, p. 126, fig. 14).
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