LOUIS XIV PERIOD DOUBLE CABINET, CIRCA 1680 Walnut, walnut burl and ebony veneer, floral marquetry in fruitwood and stained wood, chased and gilded bronze ornamentation, the front decorated with birds and foliage of flowers au naturel opening with a door and twelve drawers, The central panel with a flower vase motif on an entablature conceals a geometrical marquetry interior with six drawers, two leaves in the lower section decorated with an octagonal recessed reserve, the sides decorated with floral waterfalls, resting on later period flattened ball feet; restorations H.191 cm (75 ¼ in.) l.131 cm (51 ½ in.) P.51 cm (20 in.) Provenance : Sale in Versailles, 19 June 2011, lot 108 ; Acquired during the latter ; Then by descent to the current owner. A Louis XIV gilt-bronze mounted, walnut, burr-walnut, ebony and floral marquetry cabinet, circa 1680 *Information for buyers: If you are leaving the EU, you may need to obtain a CITES re-export certificate, which is the responsibility of the future buyer. *Information to the buyers : For an exit from the EU, a CITES re-export certificate will be necessary, at the buyer's expense. Made in the 1680s, this double cabinet is remarkable for its rich marquetry of flowers of great virtuosity and refinement. Some of the motifs decorating its panels are reminiscent of furniture made by the workshop of André-Charles Boulle, in particular those with bouquets of flowers sprouting from campaniform fleurons with three acanthus palmettes, set on consoles formed by Italian-style bands with scrolls, which can be seen on the panels of the leaves of the lower part or on the sides of the cabinet, as well as the base of the vase decorating the leaf of the upper case. These elements are reminiscent of the decoration on the back of a broken pedestal desk. (fig. 1-2) or on the leaf of a cabinet (fig. 3-4), both attributed by Calin Demetrescu to André-Charles Boulle (1). In addition, the latter, which was presented at Versailles during the exhibition 18e, aux sources du design (2), features a bird on a scroll, which is also very similar to the one on the curved leaf of our cabinet, while the interior features very similar fillet and foliate motifs (fig. 5). We know of three other pieces of furniture with almost identical motifs to ours. The closest example is a double cabinet presented at the Biennale des Antiquaires in Paris in 1986 (fig. 6), the current location of which we unfortunately do not know. The latter is also adorned with three acanthus leaf fleurons in the panels and in the spandrels of the lower panels, and with an identical vase on the pedestal panel. The flowers in the bouquets on this cabinet also include tulips and a bird, which are quite similar to those on our piece of furniture. These elements can also be found on another example sold at Artcurial on 26 November 2018, lot 15. (fig. 7) or on a Mazarin desk sold at Tajan Paris on 17 June 2015, lot 247 (fig. 8). Our cabinet and these other pieces of furniture were undoubtedly made by the same maker or, more likely, executed by the same cabinetmaker's workshop. Despite the similarities with the pieces by André-Charles Boulle mentioned above, it would be difficult to attribute the other group of furniture to which our cabinet belongs with any certainty. However, it could have been made by one of the journeymen and cabinet-makers that the master had employed over the years to work in his workshop, such as Denis Desforges, Philippe Poitou, who in 1672 married Constance Boulle, his sister (3), and in particular his first cousin, Pierre Boulle dit de Kercosve, who was already present at the wedding in 1677. André-Charles (4) and who claimed 1,700 livres from him in 1710, in a placet addressed to the Duc d'Antin, in which he represented that he had been working for 35 years for Charles Boulle, his cousin and cabinetmaker and marker to His Majesty (5). 1. C. Demetrescu, Le détail de tout. L'ornement ou repères pour une méthode d'attribution du mobilier louis-quatorzien, Les Cahiers de l'Ornement, 2, Rome, De Luca Editori d'Arte, 2016, p.160-164 and Fig. 7 and 9. 2. D. Alcouffe, (ed.),18e, aux sources du design, chefs-d'œuvre du mobilier de 1650 à 1790, cat. exp., château de Versailles 26 October 2014 to 22 February 2015, cat. 4, p. 68-71. 3. Arch. nat, Min. cent, XLIII, 144, 23 May 1672, quoted by J.-P. Samoyault, André-Charles Boulle et sa famille. Nouvelles recherches. Nouveaux documents, Genèvre, Droz, 1979, p. 36. 4. Archivo natal, Min Centro, XLVI, 124, 19 February 1677, quoted by J.-P. Samoyault, ibid, p. 38. 5. National Archives, O1 1083, p. 58-59, 17 February 1710, quoted by J.-P. Samoyault, ibid. J.-P. Samoyault, ibid, p. 93.