A rare large silver-gilt cloisonne  and en plein enamel Jewel Casket marked with the Cyrillic initials of Fedor Ruckert, Moscow, 1896-1908, with scratched inventory number 2929
Oblong, on spreading based with scroll and foliate decoration on blue ground, the front and back with scroll cartouches holding a swordsman on green ground flanked by stylized floral and foliate scrolls on pale blue ground, the ends with a stylized double-headed eagle flanked by the mythological bird Sirin with foliate scrolls on pale blue ground, the corners with shaped columns with stylized decoration, the hinged cover with a shaded enamel plaque of 'The Boyar Wedding Feast' after Konstantin Makovskii, within stylized foliate and palmate border, velvet interior, marked under base

10in. (25.3cm.) long

Lot Notes

The scratched inventory number probably indicates that this casket was retailed by Faberge.

 

'The Boyar Wedding Feast' was painted by Konstantin Egorovich Makovskii (1839-1915) in 1883, and exhibited at the Antwerp International Exposition in 1885, where it was purchased by the American jewelry merchant Charles W. Schumann, with whom it remained until 1836. It is now at Hillwood Museum, Washington. It proved a very popular scene reproduced in enamel as on this magnificent casket. See Anne Odom and Liana Paredes Arend, A Taste of Splendor: Russian Imperial and European Treasures from the Hillwood Museum, (Alexandria VA, 1998), no.159 illustrated.