We’ve had a very interesting find recently regarding this center table from the Octagon, of the Garden Pavilion, Buckingham Palace, London.
The table, which appears to be the work of the celebrated firm of royal decorators George Morant and Sons, is of giltwood with the striking decorative form of three female monopodia joined by their outstretched wings which support the circular table top. Scrolling acanthine carving supports the body of each figure, running into the muscular form of the single zoomorphic upright terminating in a powerful claw foot, standing on a shaped triform base with concave sides. The table was illustrated in Ludwig Grüner’s The Decorations of the Garden Pavillion in the Grounds of Buckingham Palace, 1846 (below).
The decorative motifs of the table are taken from ancient Greek and Roman prototypes, including the grotesque female figures, claw foot monopod, acanthus leaves, the egg and dart molding of the tabletop and waterleaf and tongue molding of the plinth. Earlier this week we discovered a drawing of a Greek basin from the Farnese museum with striking similarities to our table in Recueil des monumens les plus intéressans du Musée Royal-Bourbon et de plusieurs autres collections particulières (1845) by Raffaele Gargiulo. In this piece, three winged female monopodia with acanthine decoration support a basin, with similar moldings to the rim and triform base. While the separate decorative elements have well-known origins in antiquity, it was very exciting to see them all come together in the rendering of an ancient object- and one with such similarities in design to a piece of are own!
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Interesting blog on the wonderful Morant table. Also curious to see in the etching you include in your blog from “The Decorations of the Garden-Pavilion in the grounds of Buckingham Palace” from 1846, if you look closely between the legs of the table to the left of the Morant Table you get a glimpse of two legs probably belonging to an arm- chair. The legs are obviously taken from Graeco-Roman examples especialy the strange block feet, see: G.M.A.Richter’s book from 1966 “Furniture of the Greeks Etruscans and Romans” Plate 218 the leg and railings of a stool found at Olympia. Gruener was obviously an erudite designer accademically familiar with ancient furniture. Would love to see more images of the furniture in the Pavilion!
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