Tea at Trianon: Secrétaire

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, October 17, 2020

Secrétaire

From The Wallace Collection:

Queen Marie-Antoinette commissioned some of the most brilliant craftsmen of the 18th century to make furniture for her rooms. This desk, with a drop-down front that hides a number of shelves and small drawers, was made by her favourite cabinet-maker, Jean-Henri Riesener, a German immigrant who produced new and exciting designs for the royal court.

The Wallace Collection is lucky to possess eleven pieces attributed to Riesener, many of them from Marie-Antoinette’s private apartments. Over the past few years we have been conducting a research project to learn more about the furniture maker and his workshop, and to cast light on the materials he used, the way in which his business operated and the evolution of his designs. We have been joined in this project by Waddesdon Manor and the Royal Collection Trust, who also own important collections of Riesener furniture. (Read more.)