A gold and enamel imperial portrait snuff box, Etienne-Lucien Blerzy, Paris cock's head 1798-1809, baby's head 2me titre, the rim numbered: 8

rectangular, the lid inset with an oval miniature of Louis Bonaparte (1778-1846), King of Holland, wearing a uniform with the knight's cross and plaque of the Royal Order of the Union, the frame and borders chased with flowerheards and scrolling foliage on a sablé ground within translucent blue enamel line borders, the side and base panels with diamond-patterned engine-turning (3)

David Jacob van Lennep (1774-1853)
Mr Jacob van Lennep (1802-1868)
Jhr. Christiaan van Lennep (1828-1908)
Jhr. Roelof van Lennep (1876-1951)
Jkvr. Sylvia van Lennep (1905-1992) married 1929, Frederik Jacques Philips

Jacob van Lennep, Het leven van C. en D.J. van Lennep, beschreven en in verband met hun tijd beschouwd. Derde deel. Leven van Mr. D.J. van Lennep, Amsterdam, 1865, pp. 298-302.

The tradition of gold presentation boxes, so prevalent in France before the Revolution, was happily revived by Napoleon and members of his family who found them a useful means of expressing Imperial favour.  Makers such as Vachette, Montauban and Etienne-Lucien Blerzy, whose elder brother, Joseph-Etienne Blerzy, had been one of the most prolific box makers of the Ancien Régime, supplied the Emperor and his family with gold snuff boxes on which to mount their ciphers or portraits.The younger Blerzy is known to have supplied boxes to both Marguerit, official jeweller to Napoleon who sold the Emperor one hundred gold portrait boxes in 1806, and Gibert on the quai Voltaire. 

Etienne-Lucien Blerzy registered his maker’s mark in 1801/2 from 118 rue du Coq St. Honoré which was taken out of service on 6 April 1808.  Joseph-Etienne Blerzy entered a post-Revolutionary mark in 1798 and is recorded at the same address before 1805 and at 3 rue du Coq St. Honoré in Douët in 1806.  Blerzy Frères are listed in the Almanach du Commerce in 1800 and 1806.  On 6 April 1808, Etienne-Lucien’s widow, Victoire Boisot, entered a mark from 3 rue Coq-Héron, altered in 1809/10 to 3 rue du Coq St. Honoré.  Like boxes by J.-E. Blerzy, most of Etienne-Lucien’s are numbered on the flange, including the present lot which is inscribed 8, although these numbers are apparently nonsequential in relation to one another and do not correspond with the dates of the boxes (see C. Truman, The Gilbert Collection of Gold Boxes, Los Angeles, 1991, p. 100).

For gold boxes by Etienne-Lucien Blerzy inset with Napoleon’s portrait, see Sotheby’s Monaco, 29 November 1975, lot 128, and Sotheby’s Geneva, 11 November 1981, lot 69, both supplied by Marguerit; for a Blerzy box bearing the Emperor’s cipher, supplied by Gibert, see Christie’s Geneva, 10 November 1987, lot 376; and for a box inset a portrait of the Empress Josephine, supplied by Gibert and formerly in the David-Weill Collection, see Sotheby’s London, 9 June 1986, lot 72.  The present lot, in containing a miniature of the Napoleon’s brother, Louis, is a rare example.

Louis I Napoleon Bonaparte, King of Holland, Grand Duke of Berg and Cleves, Count of Saint-Leu, was born in Ajaccio, Corsica, the fifth surviving child of Carlo Buonaparte and his wife, Letizia Ramolino, known to history as Madame Mère.  His brother installed him on the Dutch throne on 5 June 1806, a responsibility which the new king took seriously, learning the Dutch language and endeavouring to serve as more than his brother’s puppet.  This independence led Napoleon to force Louis to abdicate on 1 July 1810, accusing him of putting Dutch interests ahead of France’s. Louis spent the rest of his life in leisurely exile. He married Hortense de Beauharnais, the Empress Joséphine’s daughter, in 1802. Their second son became the Emperor Napoleon III.

This very fine gold snuff box was given by Louis Bonaparte to David Jacob van Lennep (1774-1853), a direct ancestor of Sylvia Philips-van Lennep (1905-1992). It is well-known that King Louis often gave very elaborate and expensive snuff boxes to his friends, in many cases purchased from the jeweller Giuseppe Domenico (Joseph) Truffino in Amsterdam, purveyor to the Royal Household.

David van Lennep, a professor at the Athenaeum Illustre in Amsterdam, gave King Louis several Dutch lessons and became a good friend of his. In the biography of David van Lennep, published in 1865, his son Jacob describes how, in October 1810, an envoy of Louis visited David van Lennep at his country residence “huize ‘t Manpad” in Heemstede, where van Lennep was given this gold snuff box as a token of friendship and appreciation of the abdicated King, who was then staying in exile in Töplitz.

An article in the newspaper Nederlandsche Courant, 21 March 1922, a report was printed in which the gold box with miniature of Jacob van Lennep was mentioned. Also the letter of Louis Napoléon was printed; Monsieur van Lennep, j’ai été peiné de me trouver dans le cas de ne point dire adieu aux personnes que j’ai connu et que j’estime mais je ne les ai point oubliés, n’y les oublierai jamais pas plus que la hollande. Je vous prie de recevoir comme une marque de mon souvenir mon portrait et de vous rappeller quelques fois celui qui aime votre pays autant qu’un bon patriotte tel que vous et qui au moment d’une séparation éternelle n’a point oublié les personnes qu’il estimait et dont il désirait le plus le suffrage et l’amitié. Adieu. Louis Napoleon. Téplitz 10 Septembre 1810.