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nguthrie.bsky.social
neil guthrie
@nguthrie.bsky.social
2K followers 340 following 1.4K posts
Collector. Antiquary. The Material Culture of the Jacobites (2014). Guthrie’s Guide to Better Legal Writing (2017, 2021). Trustee, George R Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art
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nguthrie.bsky.social
Blue glass decanter (c1765-70) decorated in the London workshop of James Giles, at Bonhams, London (est. £3,000-5,000) #c18th #c18 #18thc
Catalogue entry: 'Of shouldered form in deep blue glass, cut all over with diamond facets with a band of square facets to the shoulder, richly gilt with a mosaic pattern, 24cm high'
November 26, 2025 at 11:08 AM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Owl in white porcelain (Chelsea, c1748-50), at Bonhams, London (est. £20,000-30,000) - right at the top of my Christmas wish list! #c18th #c18 #18thc
Naturalistically modelled in great detail, its talons firmly gripping the irregular rocky base upon which it stands. There is a less finely modelled polychrome example, made at the Bow factory (c1755-60), in the collection of the George R. Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art, Toronto https://emuseum.gardinermuseum.com/objects/744/owlet?ctx=150bdb9aa7fde6ef199bb310a3abb8ef762370e7&idx=0
November 25, 2025 at 11:12 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
georgianlords.bsky.social
Author and satirist Laurence Sterne was born #OnThisDay 1713.
In 1740 he was given the living of Sutton-on-the Forest, North Yorkshire, and two years later cast his vote in the county by-election, supporting the Whig candidate, Cholmley Turner, who beat his rival by just over 60 votes.
#HistParl
Portrait of a man in 18th-century clothes standing sideways on leaning on a chair. He wears black clothes with white frills at the wrists and neck and has a short grey tie-wig on his head.
November 24, 2025 at 2:10 PM
Reposted by neil guthrie
alaintruong.bsky.social
Balthasar Permoser, Hercules and Omphale, Dresden, around 1700 © Green Vault, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, photo: Jürgen Karpinski

www.alaintruong.com/2025/11/dres...
November 24, 2025 at 1:18 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Henry Moreland, chiaroscuro portrait of a girl holding a candle, engraved by Richard Purcell (c1760), with Grosvenor Prints, London, £320 #c18th #c18 #18thc
Mezzotint. 355 x 255mm (14 x 10"), large margins. Nicks in edges of margins.
November 24, 2025 at 11:11 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
paulchopelin.bsky.social
Très belle exposition David au Louvre. Chaudement recommandée.
November 23, 2025 at 1:21 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Oval tray depicting Apollo dancing w/ the Muses (Doccia, c1750-55), sold for €35,000 (below est. of €40,000-60,000, but still) at Bonhams/Cornette de St Cyr, Paris, with a piece of Doccia (c1760) I bought earlier this year for a LOT less & like better #c18th #c18 #18thc
Catalogue entry: 'Of lobed shape with a rim composed of alternating white and gold dentils, the border edged in gilt and apple green and decorated with six polychrome floral sprays of which three are beribboned, the well decorated with a scene showing Apollo and the Nine Muses within purple scrollwork borders and gilt laurel swags, 32cm diam. (museum restoration)' White rococo dish with wavy green painted decoration
November 23, 2025 at 11:23 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
bucknellupress.bsky.social
#Newbook: Body Language: Medicine and the Eighteenth-Century Comic Novel by @katalves18c.bsky.social examines the intersections of British 18C comic fiction and medical discourse, adding "a vital chapter to the study of medicine, literature, and gender in the period."

To order: tinyurl.com/3vpz7crk
November 20, 2025 at 4:52 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Alexis-Simon Belle, portrait of 'James III and VIII', the Old Pretender, at Artcurial Paris (est. €6,000-8,000) #c18th #c18 #18thc #Jacobite
Three-quarter length oval portrait of the bewigged Pretender in armour with Garter sash.
November 22, 2025 at 11:21 AM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Tureen and cover in the shape of a bunch of asparagus (Chelsea, c1755), at Bonhams, London (est. £8,000-12,000) #c18th #c18 #18thc
Naturalistically modelled and coloured as a bunch of asparagus spears in shades of green and puce, tied with brown raffia bands at each end, the stem of one spear forming the handle, 19cm long, red anchor marks, numeral 65 to tureen and 48 to cover
November 21, 2025 at 12:15 PM
Reposted by neil guthrie
theframeblog.bsky.social
In the exhibition of J-L David's work at Musée du Louvre (Oct2025-Jan2026), there is an extra dimension to the paintings in many of the frames...

David's frames: theframeblog.com/2024/04/17/j...
November 20, 2025 at 2:22 PM
Reposted by neil guthrie
historymatt.bsky.social
At the V&A for my talk, so checked out the Marie Antoinette exhibition. Some stunning buckles, obvs
November 20, 2025 at 12:59 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
For your next tea party: hot-water urn by Matthew Boulton (Sheffield plate, c1820), with Nelson & Nelson, NYC, US$3,850. Longish #c18th #c18 #18thc
Bellied bowl with half-gadrooning leaf-mounted and wrapped reeded bracket side handles; patera-mounted reeded horizontal spout with scallop-shell tap mounted to leaf-wrapped scrolls. Cover domed with pineapple finial. Knopped support and domed foot with gadrooned rim. Base square with leafing scroll-mounted corner paw supports. Rims gadrooned and interspersed with scallop shells.
November 20, 2025 at 11:13 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
cecs-york.bsky.social
📢 Our next seminar is scheduled for Tuesday 25 November with Caroline McCaffrey-Howarth @carolinemccaff.bsky.social,
presenting a paper on ‘James Tassie: A Maker of the Scottish Enlightenment’.
🗓️ Tuesday 25 November, 5pm
📍 HG/09, Heslington Hall

www.york.ac.uk/eighteenth-c...
James Tassie: A Maker of the Scottish Enlightenment - Centre for Eighteenth Century Studies, University of York
Caroline McCaffrey-Howarth discusses the modeller, collector, inventor and businessman James Tassie.
www.york.ac.uk
November 19, 2025 at 11:22 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
drgsespinosa.bsky.social
El característico papel marmoleado de los Antonio y Gabriel de #Sancha, libreros e impresores en la Aduana Vieja de Madrid #imprenta #XVIII #C18
November 19, 2025 at 7:46 AM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Delft plaque in the shape of a birdcage (c1760), passed at Christie's, NYC last month (est. US$8,000-12,000). I'm sure you could buy it at the low end of the estimate for me
Polychrome plaque in blue and white with yellow and green, in the shape of a bird in a cage with drawn blue curtains that make it look like a ten, a scene of a lady and gent in a garden below and a lady in a garden on the lid of the cage
November 19, 2025 at 11:13 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
nemgarrett.bsky.social
If you're interested in Scottish national identity, eighteenth-century fashion, and/or women in politics, you may be interested in the paper I'm presenting at the IHR Parliaments, Politics & People seminar next Tuesday. Best of all, it's online!

#eighteenthcentury #womenshistory #Scottishhistory
histparl.bsky.social History of Parliament @histparl.bsky.social · 7d
On 25 November, Dr Natalie Garrett will be speaking at the next IHR Parliaments, Politics & People Seminar, where they will be presenting on Jane, duchess of Gordon and the Romanticisation of Scottish Identity in London, c.1780-1812.

Find out more and how to attend below:
‘The Tartan Rage’: Fashion, High Society, and Scottish Identity in Eighteenth-Century London - The History of Parliament
The Tartan rage has at length reached Paris,’ declared the World in June 1787. Demand for tartan fabric and accessories had swept British high society earlier that year, with the Gazetteer and New…
historyofparliament.com
November 18, 2025 at 2:27 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
John Polidori, The Vampyre, as it first appeared in the New Monthly Magazine (1819), sold at Bonhams, London in October for £16,640 incl. premium #c18th #c18 #18thc (long)
Slim volume in contemporary calf, rebacked, gilt spine with red morocco title label, lightly rubbed. With Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein on Netfliex now and Maggie Gyllenhaal's The Bride on the way, is it time for a film version of this? Would be interesting to see a more Gothic/Romantic and less Victorian vampire, also shorn of the Hollywood trappings Last page of prefatory material and opening chapter, with attribution to Lord Byron
November 18, 2025 at 11:51 AM
nguthrie.bsky.social
'Teaplant' coffee pot (Chelsea, c1745-49) which has sagged in the kiln. Even with that, some small cracks and minor discolouration, priced at £35,000 with E&H Manners, London #c18th #c18 #18thc
White porcelain coffee pot with lid and raised sprigs of teaplant (hence the name of the pattern, but not called that in the 18C). Slightly slope resulting from mistakes or accidents in the firing process. There is a non-sagging example on the block at Bonhams, London on 1 December (est. £12,000-15,000 but they'll be expecting more)
November 17, 2025 at 11:36 AM
Reposted by neil guthrie
drbibliomane.bsky.social
Look at this excellent handkerchief from 1769 at the V & A museum: a showcase for #18thc practices of remediation. Made to imitate a quodlibet/medley print, a genre that itself aims to simulate, in a trompe l'oeil idiom, a scatter of small printed papers.
Imagine blowing your nose on that!
#scraps
Red and white printed square handkerchief, designed to make you think you are looking at an untidy heap of printed papers: a playing card, a receipt, portrait engravings, a play, sheet music, positioned every which way.
November 16, 2025 at 6:57 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Enjoying this, @carolinemccaff.bsky.social!
Cover of Caroline McCaffrey-Howarth's new biography of the collector, antiquary and philanthropist Lady Charlotte Schreiber, depicting The Music Lesson (now in the V&A), a Chelsea porcelain figure of an amorous young man and woman seated beneath an exuberantly flowering (apple?) tree. He has one arm draped around her shoulder and is ostensibly teaching her how to finger the recorder she is blowing, while her right hand rests lightly on his knee. A lamb is perched on her lap and another one looks up from the ground below. On either side of the book, some Chelsea leaf-shaped trays of my own
November 16, 2025 at 1:07 PM
Reposted by neil guthrie
rhwhite.bsky.social
A pair of Saint-Cloud potpourris, circa 1735, thickly-molded white porcelain vases of ovoid shape with encrusted flower swags and matching reticulated covers. Designed as a gadrooned vase perched on a mound of rocks with vegetation. They're big and fit nicely on the mantel over the fireplace. (ALT)
MEASUREMENTS Both are 11 1/4” (28.5 cm) in height, 7” (17.8 cm) in diameter at the base. PROVENANCE Christie’s, New York, Sale 13955, Living with Art, 7 February 2017, lot 236. Property form a New York Collection. Bruce Wilson, Memphis, Tennessee. Christie’s, New York, Sale 23287, Two American Collections: The Estates of Adolphus and Emily Andrews, San Francisco and Donald Bruce Wilson, Memphis, 18 June 2018, lot 118. If you see "holes" on an 18th century vase, it's a potpourri (too). With two other Saint-Cloud potpourris and three Sèvres flower vases.
November 14, 2025 at 11:32 AM
nguthrie.bsky.social
Here endeth the travel snaps! Tiepolo altarpieces in the Residenz chapel and the still-producing winecellar that runs underneath the whole palace. Würzburg c18th #c18 #18thc
One of two large altarpieces on the sides of the chapel, flanked by twisty columns. The other large altarpiece,similar columns Huge wooden barrels Metal tanks
November 15, 2025 at 5:07 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
The mirror room, Residenz, Würzburg #c18th #c18 #18thc
A concoction of gilt rococo tendrils framing mirrors on all surfaces of the room. The panelling and furniture of most other rooms in the Residenz had been removed to safety and were reinstalled after the war, but the mirrors in this room were too heavy to be moved. The heat from Allied bombs in WWII actually melted the glass and scorched the woodwork, so this is an entire reconstruction. The Tiepolo staircase withstood the bombs (and a 19C fire), defying the sceptics who thought Balthasar Neumann's huge vault would collapse shortly after construction
November 14, 2025 at 12:30 PM
nguthrie.bsky.social
The Emperor Hall with Tiepolo's frescos of the wedding of Frederick Barbarossa and Beatrice of Burgundy, Residenz, Würzburg #c18th #c18 #18thc
Magnificent, but not as impressive as the staircase with its dramatic progression and dizzying perspective. Here, the Bishop of Würzburg blesses the kneeling couple
November 13, 2025 at 11:48 AM