Featured Surprise! It's an inkwell ...

... hiding under these two romantic figures. The two cylindrical holders on the base of this figurine would have held inserts for ink and a pounce pot (I think). This is missing the inserts ... who knows, maybe they got separated at the thrift shop and someday they'll turn up labeled as a salt and pepper ... this piece was being called a 'candleholder', so anything's possible

Is anyone familiar with these? It has no marks other than a roman numeral II and III inscribed on the base, and a III on the underside of the top. I'm mostly finding similar ones attributed to either German manufacturer Conta&Boehme, whether marked or not, or from Staffordshire, England. Can anyone recognize from the style or decoration where this originated? Am I correct that this was from 19th century?


this is what the inserts would have looked like (more or less) I don't suppose anyone has a pair of these rolling around in a junk drawer somewhere?

 

Oh how lovely ! Id have guessed 1870s or so,mainly because of those "green man" pots. Maybe its English ?

 

I'd lean toward the German. I found this on a pinterest page of mostly German and French inkwells. Now I'm thinking it might be French. Yes late 1800s is probably correct.



Scroll down
https://www.pinterest.com/deskitems/15-human-figural-inkwells/

 

that's a nice surprise....

 

Thank you, johnny! Most of the concealed inkwells that I've seen have this type of face on the holders. I wonder why?

 

Wow! Thanks for finding that one, Pat! The RL listing is still active and the seller took a photo of a page from a book "Antique Boxes, Inside and Out", showing the same one too ... unfortunately the copy next to the photo isn't clear enough for me to read what it says.
Thank you for taking time to search around for it!!!!

 

Hi
I was trying to find proof that it was German.
I don't think the book states what country or she would have put it in her listing.

This is from the book. You're right it is too blurry. But just scanning, I can't see what might be France or Germany listed. I do see 19th century.

 

I cropped & enhanced the book entry to a point where it is just legible. Unfortunately, most of the text refers to the object to the right of the text. All that it says about the one like yours is that it is a covered inkwell & pounce pot that is 4 1/2 inches in height.

 

What a beautiful piece! I've never seen an inkwell like this before, thank-you for posting this

if I find any I'll let you know! While looking for some mugs this morning I did find 2 Victorian glass bird feeder things in a box, no idea when or where they came from, I have way too much stuff,lol.

 

Thanks for posting that ... I tried, but couldn't ... every time I right clicked on the photo in the listing, the photo would just get magnified instead of bringing up the menu to allow me to copy. I worded that awkwardly ... hope you got what I was trying to say.

 

How you were able to read that is beyond me ... but thank you so much for deciphering that blurry bit.

 

Thank you! I can relate (to the too much stuff) ...

 

Photos on RL are protected from copying in that way. Place the cursor off to a side of the page, not over an image, & right click. Select View Page Info & then select the Media tab. You have to search a little, but generally what you want is a file tagged as 'image', not 'background' or 'icon'. The preview pane shows you what's in a selected file. You can save the image using the button. If you just want to copy without saving the file, you can copy the URL for the photo, go to it & copy from there. E.g., here's one of your photos:

https://www.antiquers.com/attachments/p1130375-1-jpg.101678/

 

Cool! Thank you, Bronwen! You explained that procedure so clearly ... I actually think I can follow your steps fairly easily

 

Sometimes it's a handy trick, such as when trying to compile reference material, or keeping records of your own purchases. Or pasting pix to Antiquers.