Snuff or rosary box, Grand Tour souvenir variety from the Victorian or Napoleon III era, c.1850-70s. The portrait miniature is the type that would have been painted "après", or after a famous painting of this historical figure, and whose likeness was popular after a visit to Versailles or the Louvre, Paris. The form on this one is typically thought to have been a pocket watch box, or a box that might have come with a rosary inside, probably also ivory beaded. It's been in my collections for decades. Time to downsize.
Good to very good for age and type, you can see there is an old chip which was well-repaired long before I acquired it, by the pushbutton opener. It's very stable. Also, there is an age hairline visible on the top of the box, typical of this material which does shrink over the centuries and cause some shrinkage lines. It is a heavy box for its size, the material is quite thick. The painting is in gouache on natural wafer, hand painted, and is set and preserved well under original cover glass and its brass mount. We'd date this one c.1850s.
IMPORTANT NOTE regarding antique tortoise shell or ivory: We are great supporters of protection for endangered species in our modern world. We never buy or sell anything 100 years or newer; we donate to anti-poaching organizations; we don't hunt; we conserve in ways that impact global warming (we're totally solar at home), knowing those measures also protect the animals in the wild today. We also recognize the vast cultural history we preserve with our care and reverence for these antique objects, and agree with CITES that objects over 100 years of age have nothing whatsoever to do with species depletion in our current world.
Our offering exceeds the age limitation of "more than 100 years of age", and is well within the exemption for CITES regulation. If imported, met the CITES regulation. This item will be handled and shipped from our Utah business, and is not available for shipment internationally, nor within the USA to California, NY, Nevada, Hawaii, New Jersey, Oregon, Washington if it contains ivory, sorry. Please see our small print for more details.
