A fine Italian pietre dure and porphyry topped gilt-bronze centre table, the top Florentine mid 19th century

of rectangular form, the top inlaid with a bunch of grapes and vine leaves and a spray of flowers flanked by butterflies, with shells, ribboned pearls and a coral at each corner, on a black ground within a malachite and porphyry border, the pierced frieze with a band of anthemions and stylised flowers, centred by a panther mask and with a panther mask at each corner, above a stylised feather scroll and foliate motif, on composite baluster and disc tapering legs with an X-form stretcher centered by a basket of fruit

Comparative Literature:
Anna Maria Massinelli, The Gilbert Collection, Hardstones, London, 2000, p. 97, no. 29, , p. 108, no. 35, p. 109, no. 36.

This top with its traditional black marble ground with an outer malachite border and central decorative motif flanked at each corner by shells is typical of the work of Florentine manufactories in the second half of the 19th century. Theirs was a re-interpretation in the 19th century manner of the naturalistic designs that developed in the Grand Ducal workshops in the 17th century. See Massinelli op. cit., p. 108, fig. 35 and p. 109, fig. 36 for Florentine table tops conceived in a similar vein with shells and strings of ribboned pearls.