Louis XVI.— With the advance in the exca vation of the beautiful furnishings of Pompeii and Herculaneum, the Classical style came into full power in the decorative arts. Furniture was built on more rigid lines, but light and portable, even slender, not on the Louis Qua tone massive 'scale; the former contorted panels now become rectangles with plain lines. A list of tables must include work tables, toilette tables, gueridons (small round tables), 'kidney-shaped° tables, consoles, as well as bureaus, secretaires, etc. The tops of tables, secretaires, etc., often have a small ggallery° or balustrade of open-work copper serving as border. Chairs are light, sofas narrow. Bed steads have canopies and flowing silk curtains; the woodwork is painted or has tapestry panels. It stands in a niche in the wall. Chests of drawers are in mahogany and have eagle-claw feet. Very fancy furniture supports run to griffins and sphinx forms. Most furniture legs are straight and show fluted decoration. Some legs curve inwards. Carving is always carefully executed. Seats, sofas, benches and forms have stuffed cushions; much of these are more the work of upholsterers than joiners or cabinet makers. The armchair 'it medaillon° (medal lion back) is a characteristic Louis Quinze piece. The °tete-I-fete° settee held only two Persons. There were 'tabourets I accotoirs° (stools with sides to lean on) ; the 'cabriolets was a small seat for the boudoir; the gpliant° (folding chair) had X supports. Decorative motifs are the Classic: egg-pattern (oyes), molding, laurels, chaplets, strapwork, palms, antique urns, heads of lions, pine-apples, rings, crowns, imbrications, medallions, shields, quivers. Truly characteristic is the 'flowing found also knotted. Noted cabinet makers were Roentgen, Beneman, Saunier, Schwerdfeger, Avril, Carlin, Lavasseur. Rie sener continued his successes. Noted carvers were Gouthiere, Clodion, etc. Thomire was a talented bronze worker.
Empire.— War had done its work. Art talent and inspiration were dead. Cmsarism produced mediocre copies of the Roman models in the coldest form. We find curule chairs, re ferring to the Consulate; candelabra (lampa daires); there are 'Neptune" beds, beds. Tables are mostly round, and consoles, pier-tables, etc., have frequently marble tops. There are bookcases, cabinets, secretaires, dress ing tables, all in the sombre, heavy, exaggerated 'Romans lines. Desks often have a hinged flap that lets down. There is an excess of veneer ing. Mahogany is in its fullest vogue, but does not lend itself well to the chisel; it best dis plays itself in architectural molding and turned work. Its mottled and veined beauties show best in flat, polished surfaces. The decorative motifs are the sphinx, war trophies in Roman style (helmets, glaives, etc.) ; the consular fasces with projecting axe refer to the con sulate of Napoleon; swan-necks are frequent as supports; rams' and lions' heads are common, also the anthemion. The initial N surrounded by a laurel wreath is ubiquitous. The imperial eagle perches everywhere; Liberty (Phrygian) caps and 'winged Victories" abound. The Jacob brothers were leading cabinet-makers; Thomire did fine bronze decoration. Architect Perrier devoted time to decorative furniture de signs, Fontaine also.
German Germany was in utter pagan barbarism until the English monk Win f rid (about 718) with his missionaries preached the Gospel there. He was murdered there in 755 and canonized (as Saint Boniface) later. In the course of his activities he built Catholic churches and monasteries at Saint Galle, Fulda, Reichenau, Saint Emeran, etc., and in these establishments his followers trained native arti sans in woodwork and metalwork. They
formed schools and centres for all the arts. They became, by this means, participators in the Carlovingian epoch. But till the 13th cen tury the arts were almost entirely devoted to the Church. Secular furniture remained mostly roughly carpentered pieces, such as trestles and boards for tables, benches of wood for table seats, benches of stone or brick built into the walls for the retainers. The earliest pieces in the decorative arts show Byzantine tendency, then Byzantine-Gothic. With the 13th century the Gothic style of architecture arrived and, of course, the decorative work on furniture was on strictly architectural lines. Gradual advance ment in civilization and wealth brought to the middle classes the pieces of home furniture conducive to comfort in civil life. Augsburg, Nuremberg, Ulm, Ratisbon, Luneville became industrial centres with artistically furnished homes. Artist decorators produced fine carving and elaborate furniture construction, and en gravers and artists aided with clever designs for the artisans. These latter so-called 'Little Masters° had among them such talented genius as is found in the work of J. Collaert, Theodor and Johann de Bry, of Frankfort, Virgil Solis of Nuremberg Dieterlin, etc. And as produc tions of these talents we get the most interesting art effects in woodcarving. The German cab inet-makers made beautiful pieces of furniture rich in architectonic design enriched with grotesques, grimacing human faces, etc., boldly yet minutely carved. The German bureau (Kunstschrank) with its architectural facade, its multitude of incrustations. and its cleverly hidden secret drawers, was so popularly useful as to have a great demand for over a hundred years. But German woodcarvings are the great inspiration the world over, rivaling the Italian though differing so entirely with the Teutonic love for the feudal and Gothic treatment. Noted workers of the 16th century were Krug, Flotner, Teschler, etc. Peter Vischer, Korne mann and others brought the Italian Renaissance to Germany, and the great advances and pro lific work of the second half of the 16th cen tury were continued into the next century. Marquetry and encrusted panels, also "pietra dura" or Florentine mosaic (inlays of colored pebbles), ivory and mother-of-pearl inlays were beautifully carried out on bureaus as in Italy. Nuremberg and Augsburg were the centres for such cabinet furniture. Ulrich Baumgarten, maker of the renowned "pommerscher Kunst schrank" (now in the Berlin Museum), was of Augsburg. This art object was built for Phillip II of Pommerania and took 25 years to deco rate. Phillip Hainhofer was his partner. Lorenz Zick of Nuremberg did wonderful open work in ivory. Locksmithing was a German art carried to great perfection in that century with its picturesque metal artistry in chiseled and beaten iron in great and elaborate designs. War in Germany in the 18th century destroyed all chance of notable advancement in the decora tive arts; and in the latter part of that century the Louis Quinze style was saturating all artistic endeavor throughout Europe. In the 19th century the great evolutions in furniture brought about by the English cabinet-makers carried everything is the way of opposition before it. • English From its insular tion England's progress in the furniture and cabinet-making art has been, at different per iods, a tardy copying of Continental styles when traveling experts visited her shores, of develop ing entirely original conceptions of construction or decoration, or of blending foreign and native methods and motifs. Its earliest, crude work is as its neighbors.