Rhode Island Furniture Archive - Yale University Art Gallery

Photo: Courtesy Detroit Institute of Arts, 31.15 Click the image to enlarge	Tea table
	Object number RIF4431
	Maker Maker Unknown
	Dimensions 25 1/2 � 30 1/2 � 20 in. (64.77 � 77.47 � 50.8 cm)
	Date 1740–80
	Current location Detroit Institute of Arts
	Geography Made in Rhode Island (view a map of Rhode Island)
	Medium Walnut (primary); yellow poplar (corner blocks)
	Marks None
	Inscriptions Illegible chalk and graphite, on underside of top; “V,” in graphite, on top of one of long rails and incised in corresponding blocks (probably later)
	Provenance Charles R. Morson (died 1929), New York; sold to Detroit Institute of the Arts, Michigan, 1931
	Associated names Charles R. Morson
	Construction The underside of the rectangular, single-board top is rabbeted to align with the rails below, and the blocks atop the legs and their attendant triangular vertical glueblocks. Several lengths of later molding are glued to it in two transverse rows. Within the rabbet at the top?s edge are multiple empty fastener holes and brass screws, indicating the modes of the top?s attachment to the applied molding above and to the skirt below. At the top of each rail at its midpoint is a small rectangular glue block. The rails are tenoned into the rectangular blocks atop each leg. The interior corner of the top of each rectangular block slopes downward, as do the tops of the two attendant vertical triangular glue blocks. A quarter round molding is fixed to the bottom of the rails? skirts with glue and wood-filled fasteners. Knee brackets are held on with glue and a single nail; one is replaced. The cabriole legs have angular legs with rounded ankles and slipper feet with rounded tops. Examined by P.E. Kane and J.N. Johnson, August 4, 2014; notes compiled by T.B. Lloyd.
	Bibliography Josephine Walther, "An American Table and Chair," Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts 12, no. 5 (February 1931): 72–73, ill. Patricia E. Kane et al., Art and Industry in Early America: Rhode Island Furniture, 1650–1830, exh. cat. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Art Gallery, 2016), 213n4.