Images(2)

Tea Table, Round

Date1755-1770

OriginAmerica, South Carolina, Charleston

MediumAll components of mahogany.

DimensionsOH: 28 1/4" OW: 30 5/8"

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1990-43

DescriptionAppearance: Non-rotating round tea table form; thin, unmolded top; column and baluster form pillar has narrow necking at base of baluster and large gouge cuts at lower end between each leg joint; shoe plates on base of plain feet are integral with feet.

Construction: The legs are dovetailed into the underside of the shaft. Carved arched recesses where the legs join the shaft effectively mask the fact that the shaft extends below the bottom edge of the legs. There is no metal brace, or "spider," on the base of the shaft. The top of the shaft is tenoned through the nearly two-inch-thick block that joins the top to the base. This joint is further secured with thin wedges driven into the tenon.
Label TextRound tea tables were produced in many southern cabinet centers, but design and construction varied considerably from one locale to another. While the mahogany table illustrated here has only a vague oral tradition of ownership in Charleston, its attribution is well supported by close aesthetic and structural parallels with a number of other Charleston examples. Virtually identical tea tables descended in the Deas, Des Partes, Huger, and Ravenel families of Charleston. Several candlestands from the same shop retain Charleston histories as well. Details common to the group include turned baluster-and-column shafts, slipper feet with sharply ridged upper profiles and large pads, and the use of a solid chamfered block instead of a "birdcage" at the juncture between the shaft and the table top.1

A more ornate version of the present tea table attributed to the same unidentified maker descended in the Michel and Fraser families of Charleston (MESDA research file 8664). The design and proportions of its baluster and column closely match those on the CWF table, as do the shaped battens under the top, the arched recesses along the lower edge of the shaft and legs, and the chamfered top block. The overall dimensions of the two tables are exactly the same. However, the Michel-Fraser table is further embellished with ball-and-claw feet, foliated knee carving, and an elaborately shaped top with a raised and molded edge.

Cabinet shops often made both plain and ornate versions of the same furniture form. Although every additional decorative element increased the final cost of the object, some customers were willing to pay substantially higher prices in the name of fashion. The shop of Charleston cabinetmaker Thomas Elfe is typical in that regard. In 1773, Elfe produced a "large, round," and apparently plain tea table for which he charged the modest sum of thirteen pounds South Carolina currency. Two years later, he charged nearly twice that amount for his most elaborate version of the form, a "Scallop tea table with Eagle Claws."

InscribedNone.
MarkingsNone.
ProvenanceThe table, acquired at an Asheville, N. C., auction in 1990, has an oral tradition of ownership in a Charleston family.