BAROQUE CABINET, END OF THE 16th CENTURY, SOUTH GERMANY, PROBABLY AUGSBURG Inlaid on all sides with ash, maple, stained wood, rosewood and fruitwood fillets, engraved metal ornamentation, decorated with figures in an architectural landscape animated by imaginary towns and embellished with birds and plants, The flap is decorated on the reverse with a central frame showing a sleeping woman lying down surrounded by a frieze decorated with floral scrolls, the interior with a motif of dogs, deer, foxes, deer and birds in an architectural background. It opens with twelve drawers and four leaves, the sides fitted with handles, and stands on later period flattened ball feet. H.65 cm (25 ½ in.) l.93,5 cm (36 ¾ in.) P.41 cm (16 ¼ in.) Provenance: From an estate in the south of France belonging to an aristocratic Italian family. A Southern German Baroque ashtree, mapletree, rosewood and fruitwood cabinet, late 16th century, probably Augsburg *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. This cabinet is a perfect illustration of the wealth of marquetry that developed in southern Germany in the second half of the 16th century, particularly in Augsburg. Already famous throughout Europe for its goldsmith's work, Augsburg was also "favoured by its wide variety of indigenous woods and the perfection of many types of saw" (cf. R. Baarsen, German Furniture, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, 1998, p. 6-15). The city's princely demands led to the emergence of numerous cabinet-makers' workshops. These luxurious travel objects, known as Schreibsschränke, were designed for the curiosity cabinets of wealthy collectors, who displayed medals, corals and shells. But this cabinet is most notable for its decoration: a skilful and meticulous assembly of fine pieces of multiple native woods, giving rise to architectural whims and imaginary geometric edifices that defy the laws of natural perspective; if these decorations seem almost surreal, they are in fact the work of the Bavarian engraver Lorenz Stöer (1537-1621). Influenced by the work of Albrecht Dürer and probably a pupil of his, Stöer published his only collection, Geometrica et perspektiva, in Augsburg in 1567, in which he depicted a large number of ruins and architectural perspectives for the sole use of the city's cabinetmakers. Our cabinet is also distinguished by its rich inlaid decoration of strikingly naturalistic animals and birds, such as those found on a cabinet sold at Sotheby's London on 4 December 2012, lot 311, or one sold at Sotheby's Paris on 17 December 2008, lot 159. The flap of our cabinet is decorated on the reverse with an allegorical figure depicting a sleeping woman flanked by a clepsydra; in this respect, we would point out that a large Augsburg cabinet with an engraved decoration of female figures representing musical allegories sold at Christie's London on 7 October 2022, lot 323.