Augsburg jewelry casket by Johannes Mann (1679-1754) and Emanuel Eichel (1690-1752)

An extremely rare Augsburg jewelry casket, veneered with tortoiseshell and mother-of-pearl, embellished with silvered ripple moldings. All sides showing an engraved mother-of-pearl inlaid still life of flowers with insects.
Signed by Johannes Mann (1679-1754) and Emanuel Eichel (1690-1752).
One lid, two drawers, an interior compartment with one secret drawer, all lined with marble paper.
Very good condition.
Ca 1720.

This casket belongs to a small serie of works of art, all made with similar decoration of a mixture of two tones of tortoiseshell, inlaid with mother-of-pearl depicting flowers, birds and insects ; combined with silver or silvered accents mostly ripple moldings. The similarity with a cabinet in the Franz Mayer Museum is so obvious that the cabinet must be from the same ebonymaker as our casket which is signed from the Eichel-Mann Workshop.
Sothebys sold a chessboard (“Treasures” 04-07-2012 ; Lot 15), attributed to the same workshop. Dr. Max Tillmann (Art curator and Museum director) wrote the background information for that lot which describes the work of the Eichel-Mann workshop. Most works of art of their workshop landed in Royal Collections because of their outstanding quality. The Danzig-born Silberkistler, Emanuel Eichel, worked mostly on a small scale, mostly with tortoiseshell-panels, mother-of-pearl, ivory, etc… According to Stetten (a chronicler of the Augsburg history of craftsmanship), Eichel produced very fine jewelry-cases, boxes, chessboards and further objects made of similar materials. His greatest piece was a jewelry box with the deeds of Emperor Charles VI.

Provenance :
Private Collection UK

Comparanda :
- Casket, Hans Schell Collection, Graz (A)
- Casket, Museo Poldi Pezzoli, Milano (IT)
- Clock-cabinet, Museo Franz Mayer, Mexico.

European certificat CITES available.