Snuffbox

Small gold boxes intended to hold snuff, a form of powdered and often scented tobacco, became a focus of an elaborate social ritual and a symbol of extravagance and vanity in eighteenth-century France.

The containers were usually of such luxurious nature that they were the ultimate fashion accessories in eighteenth-century Europe and were frequently given as presents. Beginning in the 1720s and continuing up to the French Revolution, snuff boxes were produced in significant quantities.

Parisian marchands merciers (dealers in luxury goods) dealt in a range of goods from Japan and China. This varicolored gold box is decorated with chased architectural motifs and landscape scenes clearly influenced by the designs seen on any number of screens or lacquer boxes. Furniture in The Met collection such as 2019.283.4 and 2019.283.3a, b incorporate Japanese and Chinese lacquer panels respectively and exemplify the tremendous influence of the arts of the East on eighteenth-century decorative arts in general and in this snuffbox in particular.

Inscribed on the rim of this snuffbox is “Garand Paris,” probably for the Parisian goldsmith Jean François Garand (master 1758, d.1778). While the box is clearly marked with the devices of the prominent goldsmith Charles Le Bastier, Garand may have been the retailer.

Particularly noteworthy is that the division of the lid and base does not interfere with the ribbed ground of the box.

Daughter of one of the founders of the Weyerhaeuser Timber Company, Catherine D. Wentworth (1865–1948) was an art student and painter who lived in France for thirty years. She became one of the most important American collectors of eighteenth-century French silver and on her death in 1948 bequeathed part of her significant collection of silver, gold boxes, French furniture and textiles to the Metropolitan Museum.