VIZAGAPATAM, MID-18TH CENTURY

These Vizagapatam side chairs illustrate the successful fusion of Indian decoration to English form, and have a truly global provenance. Originally part of a suite of six single chairs, six armchairs, a settee and centre table. By tradition the set has been associated with the Nawab of Arcot, who is believed to have given them to an East India Company official. The suite was later in the collection of the greatest of all the English Rothschild collectors, Lionel de Rothschild (1808-1879), at 148 Piccadilly, London, where it was identified as the ‘Spanish suite’ because it had been acquired by him in Spain (1). In 1882, the suite was in the Library at 148 Piccadilly where it remained until 1937 until sold together with the remaining household contents by order of Victor, 3rd Lord Rothschild (1910-1990) (2).

LIONEL DE ROTHSCHILD AND 148 PICCADILLY

Lionel de Rothschild was the eldest son of Nathan Mayer de Rothschild (1777-1836), who came from Frankfurt to England in 1798 to establish the family’s mercantile and banking business, N M Rothschild & Sons. In 1841, Lionel acquired 148 Piccadilly, one of the best locations in London, in effect two houses, numbers 147 and 148, merged into one, which became the backdrop for his great art collection that included Old Master paintings and French 18th century decorative arts.

In the 19th century, the Rothschild family had not only the financial wherewithal to buy in any field they chose but their international contacts enabled them to make acquisitions outside the normal bounds of dealers and auction houses (3). The Vizagapatam suite of seat-furniture and table were acquired by Lionel while in Spain; in 1834, he was in Madrid where he negotiated an important and lucrative contract with the Spanish government, who were in chronic financial difficulties, under which the Rothschilds secured the right to the revenue of the quicksilver mines of Almadén as security against a loan. For services to Spain, he was awarded the Order of Isabella in 1835, and it seems likely he acquired the Vizagapatam furniture in this period.

In March 1882, it was recorded in the Library at 148 Piccadilly; it must have been one of the most prized pieces of furniture because when the contents were divided between Lionel’s three sons, it was the eldest son and heir Nathaniel Mayer Rothschild, 1st Lord Rothschild (1840-1915), who inherited the Vizagapatam suite. Lionel de Rothschild evidently admired Anglo-Indian furniture; he also purchased a pair of ivory chairs from the celebrated Stowe sale of 1848, described as ‘once the property of Tipooo Sahib, and were sent by Warren Hastings as a present to Queen Charlotte at the time his trial was pending. Mr Russell secured them for the sum stated [42 guineas], and they are now the property of Baron Lionel de Rothschild’ (4). Unfortunately, from 1904 the Vizagapatam furniture is erroneously identified as ‘Spanish’, undoubtedly because it had been acquired in Spain, and this was a soubriquet that it retained up to at least 1928 (5).

VIZAGAPATAM AS THE SOURCE

These chairs were executed by artisans of the kamsali cast in the East Indian port of Vizagapatam in the mid-18th century. This style of furniture is characterised by its ivory decoration of dense trailing flowers, large densely foliated trees issuing from urns and fantastic animals and birds inlaid on teak, padouk, rosewood or ebony, all timbers readily available in the port. The quality of the Vizagapatam work was noted by Major John Corneille, visiting in 1756, who wrote: 'the place is likewise remarkable for its inlay work, and justly, for they do it to the greatest perfection' (6). Vizagapatam already had a flourishing textile trade, a centre for the production of the colourful cloth known as chintz, which was in high demand in the west and ensured that the port was regularly visited by East India Company ships. Indeed, it was the very reason for much European settlement in the region, with an English textile factory established in the port in 1668 while the Dutch trading post at Bimlipatam had been founded as early as 1628. The cabinet trade in Vizagapatam had developed at the end of the 17th century when local craft skills using ivory were married to western furniture forms and the decoration was derived directly from that seen on textiles, and, in particular, on palampores or bed covers. While the treatment of the marquetry is unmistakably Indian, a limited range of Western elements were also introduced under the influence of the English, Dutch and Portuguese, for example, in the chairs offered here, the simulated acanthus carving on the splat, apron and legs, executed in ivory inlay, with detailing provided by engraving the ivory and filling the indented lines with black lac. In this example, the Indian craftsmen were evidently modelling these chairs on an English carved mahogany prototype or perhaps referring to a printed source. A set of fourteen chairs fashioned after an English model of the type published as plate XVI of the 3rd edition of Thomas Chippendale’s Director (1762) was commissioned by Alexander Wynch, Governor of Fort St. George from 1773 to 1775, now in the Royal Collection (7).

THE DATING, EVOLUTION OF THE PATTERN

It is not known precisely when these chairs were made but it seems likely it was in the mid-18th century, preceding the shift in Vizagapatam work away from inlaying in favour of veneering surfaces entirely with ivory (8). Amin Jaffer notes that the inlaid designs are unusually bold and free, and are surpassed in their exuberance only by those on an ivory-inlaid cabinet and stand at Kingston Lacy, Dorset, which is very likely to have come from the same workshop. The chairs are a variant of an armchair, last seen in the 1930s, whose splat is inlaid in ivory with a ‘flowering tree’ design and whose seat bears a needlework panel which reads: ‘This Chair was sent a Present to Lady Harland in the year 1772 from the Nabob of Arcot…’ (9). The Nawab of Arcot was an ally of the East India Company, who was in competition with the French Compagnie des Indes over Indian trade and resources, political power and territory. He was evidently an anglophile for he employed the British artists Francis Swain Ward, Tilly Kettle, and George Willison to paint portraits of himself and his family, which were then sent as gifts to his allies including George III (1738-1820). The Nawab owned and used Western-style furniture at his palace in Chepauk, Madras, ordering, for example, a suite of chairs and tables from London in 1767, and chairs, although Western in form, featured among the gifts exchanged between Indian rulers and Europeans.

THE SET SOLD IN 1937

The whole set was sold by the Rothschild family in 1937, and subsequently dispersed. Of this set, a pair of armchairs, the settee and the table are missing.
A pair of single chairs sold anonymously, Christie’s, London, 9 July 1998, lot 51 (£41,100 inc. premium), and again from the Collection of Lily & Edmond Safra, Sotheby's, New York, 3-4 November 2005, lot 141, $144,000 inc. premium). A pair of single chairs sold anonymously, Christie’s, London, 9 July 1998, lot 52 (£38,900 inc. premium).
A pair of single chairs sold anonymously, Christie’s, London, 9 July 1998, lot 53 (£47,700 inc. premium), and again the ‘Pinto Collection’, Christie’s, Paris, 12 September 2017, lot 66 (€295,500 inc. premium).
A pair of open armchairs sold anonymously, Christie’s, London, 9 July 1998, lot 50 (£84,000 inc. premium).
A pair of open armchairs acquired by General Antonio Tommasi in Florence in 1768, sold Christie’s, London, 1 July 2004, lot 20 (£184,450 inc. premium).

(1) The Rothschild Archive, London, 000/848/17/1: Nathaniel Mayer, 1st Lord Rothschild (1840-1915): 148 Piccadilly inventory, undated but probably before 1904, and with manuscript corrections to 1904.
(2) ‘Catalogue of the Magnificent Contents of 148 Piccadilly, W.1’, Sotheby & Co., 19th April 1937 and three following days, p. 64, lots 195, 196, 197 and 198; plate XXXI.
(3) M. Hall, ‘The English Rothschilds as Collectors’, The Rothschilds: Essays on the History of a European Family, Woodbridge, 1994, p. 265.
(4) A. Jaffer, Furniture from British India and Ceylon, London, 2001, p. 244.
(5) The Rothschild Archive, London, 000/848/17/1; 000/848/18/1; 000/848/20/1; 000/848/17/2
(6) ed. M. Edwardes, Major J. Corneille, Journal of my Service in India, London, 1966, pp.100-101.
(7) En suite with a pair of settees. RCIN 487 and 489.
(8) A. Jaffer, ‘On the Coast of Coromandel’, Christie’s Magazine, July 1998.
(9) R.W. Symonds, ‘Furniture from the Indies – III’, The Connoissuer, May-August 1934, p. 119, no. XIV; sold Christie’s, Los Angeles, 12-14 March 2001, lot 57 ($127,000 inc. premium).