SILVER DRAWER WITH THE ARMS OF NAPOLEON I, KING OF ITALY By Martin-Guillaume BIENNAIS, Paris (1805-1809) Resting on a pedestal decorated with a frieze of laurel leaves. The lower part of the body plated with leaf friezes between a corded frieze and a pearled frieze. The top of the body applied with four heads of Emperor and Empress in the Antique style and the large arms of Napoleon King of Italy, girded with the collar of the Legion of Honour. The handles are attached to the body by two medallions with women's heads in a radiating frame. The lid is plain, the ebony grip in the shape of an acorn resting on a terrace of laurel leaves. H. 15 cm - W 17 cm Gross weight: 466 g B.E. Marks : Under the base: Martin-Guillaume BIENNAIS goldsmith's hallmark and Greek woman's head hallmark. On the edge of the foot: two silversmith's hallmarks, one of which is barely legible. On the frame of the foot: guarantee mark Paris 1798-1809. Control hallmark (weevil). On the neck: title mark Paris 1798-1809 and control mark (weevil). Inside the lid: Greek woman's head hallmark. On the lid frame: control mark (weevil) and guarantee. Goldsmith's hallmarks missing from the lid and a small piece of ebony missing from the base of the grip. Provenance : Former Napoleonic collection of the Prince's Palace of Monaco (1st sale, lot 167) A silver-gilt drageoir applied with the arms of Napoleon King of Italy Related work : A coffee pot transformed into a chocolate pot with the arms of Napoleon King of Italy, with a similar decoration, conserved in the Musée du Louvre, inv. OA 10270. Commentary: Martin-Guillaume Biennais Two silversmiths clearly emerged during the Empire in Paris, two silversmiths with very little in common: Jean-Baptiste-Claude Odiot and Martin-Guillaume Biennais. While the former came from a dynasty dating back to the end of the 17th century that continued after him until the beginning of the 20th century, the latter was a phenomenon in his own right. The son of a ploughman from the Orne region, he was born on 29 April 1764. Much more is known about his life and work now that Anne Dion-Tenenbaum, curator of Objets d'Art at the Louvre, has devoted an in-depth study to him. After being described as a servant and then a turner in Argentan (in 1785), he reappeared in 1788 at the head of a tableware business located at 510 rue Saint-Honoré, near the Pavillon de Marsan in the Louvre. The address of his workshop did not change, only the numbering of the street: 119-121 then 281-283 and finally 171-173. This workshop can still be seen today and is occupied by an earthenware shop. From 1791 onwards, the workshop, which bore the strange name of "Au Singe Violet" (The Purple Monkey), enjoyed astonishing prosperity. The year 1799 marked its finest hour: the young General Bonaparte (aged 28) walked through the door of the workshop and asked the potter to supply him with various objects for his campaigns. While all his competitors refused, Biennais, with a keen sense of commerce that would never leave him, accepted the order, knowing that it would only be honoured later. The spectacular result was that, in 1804, Biennais was officially appointed "goldsmith to His Majesty the Emperor". It was not until 1801 or 1802 that Biennais registered his goldsmith's hallmark. Here again, a new singularity: he was the only Parisian goldsmith of all time to use only one letter in his master mark, a B for Biennais. And his différent (a symbol inherent to every silversmith, placed between the initials of the silversmith) is naturally a monkey, seated, facing left. Biennais drew on the designs of the great architects of his time, in particular Percier, but also Fontaine. His workshop employed nearly 200 people (some say as many as 600). Naturally, after Waterloo, the Court's commissions came to an abrupt halt, and it was the European courts that stepped in to fill the gap: Russia, Württemberg... At the end of 1821, having neither son nor son-in-law, he sold his studio to Jean-Charles Cahier and went on to manage his considerable real estate holdings, divided between his château de la Verrière in Mesnil St Denis and Paris. After his death in 1843, his widow bought a house in Yerres, now a museum, which was taken over for almost 20 years by the painter Caillebotte. Under the Empire, following the example of the Emperor, all the members of the imperial family entrusted their commissions to Biennais, and Odiot had great difficulty making his voice heard at the Tuileries. Only Madame Mère succumbed to his siren calls. All the other members of the family entrusted Biennais with their orders, taking care to highlight their chosen "fetish" animal: the swan for the Empress, the bee and the eagle for the Emperor, the butterfly for Pauline Borghese, the Emperor's sister, etc... When Napoleon took over the new kingdom of Italy in May 1805, Biennais once again benefited from his largesse. However, only a very small number of coins still bear Napoleon's arms as King of Italy. Most had been sent to Vienna when the Empire fell, and the Emperor of Austria decided to have the imperial arms removed and replaced with his own. This service can still be seen today in the Hofburg. Among the few pieces that survived this reversal of destiny, a coffee pot transformed into a chocolate pot can be found in the collections of the Louvre (Inv. OA 10270). Anne Dion also mentions in her book a tray and coffee pot with these same arms, illustrated in Connaissance des Arts, November 1966, p. 84. This tray, from the Albert Frère collection, was sold on 16 November 2005 (lot 97) by Sotheby's Geneva (Diane Collection).