Lot 407
FINE JAPANESE KOMAI DAMASCENE OCTAGONAL BOX AND COVER
MEIJI PERIOD
Fine Asian & Islamic Works of Art
Auction: 3 November 2023 from 09:00 GMT
Description
明治 日本国京都住駒井製款 金工八角型蓋盒
supported on four key-fret bracket feet, the flat top decorated with pavilions in a mountainous landscape, encircled by a flowerhead border, the sides of the cover and the box respectively adorned with key-fret and maple leaves, both interiors of the cover and box engraved with small houses in landscape, the base engraved Nihon koku Kyoto ju Komai sei (made by Komai from Kyoto, Japan) beneath the company dragonfly mark in a raised rectangle, surrounded by leafy tendril and a butterfly in flight
Dimensions
6cm wide; 127g
Provenance
Provenance: Private English collection, London; acquired by current owner’s great-aunt Etta May Gubbins (1871-1955) during her honeymoon trip in Yokohama in 1910. Etta May Gubbins married in 1909 at Kilmallock, Ireland to Captain Burston Beresford Gubbins (1876-1929), The 13th Hussars.
May Gubbins, nee May Gibson, was the eldest of the three daughters of Edmund Gibson who was born at Quernmore Park, near Lancaster in 1824, went out to New Zealand with his brother Wilson and staked a claim to about 20,000 acres of land in South Island and died at Otago in 1886.