Cabinet

The dresser or buffet, with its cupboard, frieze drawers and open shelves, evolved as a furniture type in the areas now known as France and the Netherlands from the late Gothic period through the Renaissance. In the houses of the aristocracy they were usually placed in a gallery or antechamber where they functioned as display furniture on which important examples of the owner’s gold and silver plate, ceramics and glass were decoratively arranged during official
receptions and banquets. This was done primarily as a means of paying respect to guests, as well as publicly affirming the owner’s social rank. In the less official contexts of a garde-robe or bedroom, where one often ate, the dresser also functioned as a place on which to put ewers and basins, or other vessels, used for more private dining. The design of this example, with its two-door cupboard upper structure supported on a base with two carved sphinxes, is derived from one of a series of furniture designs published about 1560 AD by the French architectural and ornamental designer Jacques Androuet DuCerceau (AD c. 1515- c. 1585). DuCerceau played a pivotal role in disseminating the repertoire of Renaissance and Mannerist
architectural and decorative motifs designed by important Italian artists who were brought to the French court at Fontainebleau during the first half of the sixteenth century. This example was probably made in the Burgundy or Languedoc areas of France, about 1560-1580 AD. It features additional carved elements such as grotesques, and the depictions on the doors of Judith with the head of Holofernes (the Assyrian general), and David with the head of Goliath (the Philistine); both are biblical figures who represent good triumphing over evil. They flank the central figure of Mars, the Roman god of war. Together these figures possibly allude to the military accomplishments of the owner.