Articles
Round box in cinnabar lacquer * with decoration on the lid of a character (mandarin) in a pagoda landscape with a mountain in the background, cartouche signature on the side, rim decorated with braiding and geometric friezes, provenance China, XIXth century.
This box is in good condition. It is signed on the top.
A note: slight accident and restoration on one side of the cover (see arrows), some lacquer gaps (especially below), wear of time, see photos.
In Europe as in India, lacquer is a substance like a gum deposited on trees by certain species of insects, such as "tachardia lacca". This substance collected from the tree has been used to imitate Far Eastern lacquers on Japanese or Chinese style furniture since the 16th century. The lacquer, dehydrated and purified, contains according to the qualities up to 80% of “urushiol” (acid of lacquer). This material, thus pure, can be used directly as a transparent substance. If one wishes to obtain a colored material, it suffices to add special pigments, cinnabar for red, pine or lamp soot for black, and subsequently iron sulphate for black, iron sulphate for black. arsenic for green and brown. For white, a mixture of lacquer and lead carbonate (white lead), already used before our era on Chinese lacquers.
