Patch box
Applied Arts
Inventory number
2018.7.26.5.AA.BX.1783.FRDescription
Beauty spot box in brown lacquered tortoiseshell inlayed with pink gold and decorated with a miniature on ivory showing a little boy playing with his dog and his bird on a leash. The tiny box opens on three compartments. The pink gols have several hallmarks: "Fermiers Généraux" hallmark (1620-1789) and Paris 1783 hallmark (pee-wee's head and "Maître" hallmark or discharge hallmark).To finance the wars of Louis XIV, many taxes were created, including a tax on precious metals collected by farmers general. Between 1672 and 1680 successive judgments: institute a tax on the manufacture of precious metals: Le Droit du Roy determine the shape and dimension:
- Master's hallmark
- punch of Jurande create two hallmarks with fiscal significance
- the load hallmark
- the discharge hallmark.
From 1672 to 1789 the pieces of goldsmithery will be marked by four hallmarks which one is accustomed to designate under the term of "Fermiers Généraux" hallmark. From 1672 to 1789 the figures or the letters remained the same but a change of form intervened with each change of farmer (about 17 times between 1672 and 1789).
The piece finished, the silversmith presents it again at the farmer's office and pays the "Right of the King". He is then "discharged" of this debt: a fourth and last hallmark comes to testify: it is the discharge's hallmark. This hallmark, much smaller than the previous ones, varied with each farmer, and its duration generally corresponded to that of the management of the farm. It could take various forms, totally unpredictable (shoe, bird's head, dog's head, lyre, etc.) and, affixed to the finished piece, it is generally very legible, but ... .. it is sometimes absent ..! There are hundreds of discharge hallmarks.
Materials
Pink goldLacquered tortoiseshell
Yellow gold
Ivory
Enamel
Origin
1783 ParisDimensions
Width : 4.4 cmLength : 6 cm
Height : 3.8 cm