Elizabeth I walnut table

Circa 1580 - 1600
England

W 98 1/4" × H 30 1/4" × D 35 1/4"

Stock # Marh2278

SOLD

More information

Elizabeth I walnut table. The four legs carved in high relief with each leg having four putti with shells on their heads and above this a very fine Corinthian capital, joined by moulded and capped stretcher rails, with the frieze rails being gadrooned. The table was purchased by William Randolph Hearst on the 8th December 1930 from Charles Duveen of London and described as (one old Charles I carved walnut library table with carved figures on legs) for the sum of $6086.96 which is $93,749.39 in today's money. The table was purchased for St Donat's Castle in Wales. Picture and original copy of invoice pictured here. Provenance: Sir R Cooke, Athelhampton House, Dorset.(last image shown in hall) William Randolph Hearst, St Donat's Castle, Wales.

William Randolph Hearst, fictionalised by Orson Welles in the film Citizen Kane, was an obsessive collector of European – especially British – art and architecture. He was dubbed “the great accumulator” by one dealer.