Framed Illuminated Water Colour Painting with Harem Scene

A Tudor or Stuart period lead-alloy 'hornbook': incomplete rectangular plaque with small rectangular handle; bearing raised, moulded text on the obverse with hatched forms between four registers, which frame the letters of the alphabet 'ABCDE/FG[reversed]HIKL/MNOPq/RST[VW]XYZ'; low-relief octofoil in centre to the reverse. 51 grams, 75 mm



Found Yorkshire, UK. This lot is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D’Amato.

The letter 'U' has been omitted from the alphabet as is common with such objects, as has the letter 'J', suggesting that the book was produced prior to the publication of Charles Butler's English Grammar (1633) which first distinguished between I and J. The letter Z is reversed. Hornbooks were employed as learning aids and commonly made from paper mounted onto wood together with a transparent sheet of horn. Smaller, more portable lead-alloy examples such as this one are generally believed to have been mass produced, whilst still falling within the genre of 'hornbooks'. Interestingly, some scholars have argued that the mistakes and inconsistencies found on lead examples rendered them less effective learning tools, used as children's toys in families with low levels of literacy, or possibly serving as dolls' accessories.

Standing erect with left hand extended gripping a scroll; wearing a full toga fastened at the waist and draped over the body; the head with short hair in the Julian style and a laurel wreath to the brow; after the antique; mounted on a custom-made display stand. 98 grams total, 93 mm including stand



From a collection acquired on the UK art market from various auction houses and collections mostly before 2000. From an important Cambridgeshire estate; thence by descent. This lot is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D’Amato.

The statuette represents a city magistrate clad in a toga, the most famous 'official' civil dress of the Roman period between the first century B.C. and the first century A.D. The fully developed toga of Consular and Imperial Rome was shaped as a segment of a circle and about 18 and a half feet long by seven feet wide at its centre. It was decorated at times by a purple or red stripe along the straight edge. The type of garment of our statuette is similar to the one seen on the statue of Emperor Titus at the Vatican Museum.

Bifacial disc with attachment points for the swivel; obverse: profile bust of a male with beard and plumed helmet; reverse: galleon under sail. 3.99 grams, 16 mm



Acquired from the vendor's grandfather in the 1990s. Property of an Essex collector. This lot is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D’Amato.