Charming antique to vintage French Belle Epoque era Grand Tour style souvenir jewel casket, a lovely little jewelry box in the shape of a center-handled sewing box or basket with two eglomise (reverse painted) glass scenes of The "Place du Martroi" and "Sainte-Croix Cathedral" in Orleans, France! In the centre of Orléans' main square, a bronze statue (1855) depicts Joan of Arc atop a prancing steed. During the Siege of Orléans, the Basilique Cathédrale Sainte-Croix d'Orléans was visited frequently by Joan of Arc. The cathedral's stained glass windows now depict the story of Joan's actions that contributed to the lifting of the siege. We recently acquired around twenty of these wonderful little French souvenir caskets and will be adding them in the coming weeks. This one with very thick beveled glass panels on all sides and the larger top with the scene transferred & painted on the back side.
"Eglomise" is the term applied to the back-painted glass panels in these old French souvenirs. Most of them date 1800s, though they were made up through about 1910 in this manner, too. Later ones often have a photo set in instead. The early ones are our favorites, sometimes a screened ink-line like drawing that is then hand colored, or sometimes a full miniature painting original, all worked on the back side of a panel or convex plaque of glass. There are sometimes open spots left and a final step is application of thin mother of pearl panels so that the windows shimmer with pearlescent light, or architectural details are pearl - you can see how fun those are. I'm listing a whole collection from this genre, one at a time
Very good condition. Some tiny nips to the glass panels but no larger chips or cracks. The eglomise scenes iappear to be transfers from early photos with some coloration and a white/cream background. The inner base is lined in a red fabric, possibly a newer replacement. See pictures for all measurements.
