Casket with Miniature: The Right of the Lord

A plaque in glossy enamel replicates "The Right of the Lord," a painting by the cosmopolitan Russian artist Vasilii Polenov (1844-1927). The scene is set in Brittany: standing on the threshold of his castle, a lord, flanked by his hounds, addresses an elderly man who is introducing his three daughters. The Droit de Seigneur, (1874), or The Right of the Lord, (Prava gospodina) illustrates an undocumented custom, that purportedly flourished in the Middle Ages: the right of the lord of the manor to spend the "first night" with one of his tenant's daughters. Polenov painted this work while pursuing his academic training in Paris and exhibited it in the Salon of 1874 (in the Tretiakov State Gallery, Moscow, inv. no. 2651). The en plein counter enamel inside the lid is engraved with flowers and tendrils.

The rim of the lid is enameled in black with vegetal motifs executed in silver gilt filigree. Similar decoration is repeated on the box's corners. On the side faces, blossoms are rendered in red, green, and blue painted enamel. These, in turn, are flanked by blue areas with fern-like foliage.

Inscription

Provenance

Provenance (from the French provenir, 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody, or location of a historical object.

Sale, Sotheby's, New York, June 12, 1996, Lot. 234; Jean M. Riddell, Washington, D.C., June 13, 1996, by purchase [Leo Kaplan, New York, as agent]; Walters Art Museum, 2010, by bequest.