Wedding Box, Embriachi workshop, 15th century Venice

Our wedding box from the Embriachi workshops is
a masterpiece of late medieval and early
Renaissance craftsmanship that reflects the
refinement of the period. Made at the beginning of
the 15th century, this box is the work of this
important workshop.
The body of the box is decorated with complex
inlays made from tesserae of coloured or natural
bone and different types of wood (ebony).
Later wood core (19th century).
The Embriachi workshop was founded in Florence
by Baldassarre degli Ubriachi at the end of the 14th
century, before moving to Venice in 1395, where it
remained until the mid-15th century. The workshop
produced mirror frames, inlaid combs, secular
caskets, small triptychs and large altarpieces, which
were exported throughout Europe. These objects
were created from rectangular convex plates made
from the bones of large mammals such as oxen and
horses, even when the workshop moved to Venice,
a major port for importing elephant ivory to the
West. These plates are then fixed side by side on a
wooden core. Initially, Baldassarre was credited
with the entire production of these items, but other,
less important workshops in northern Italy have
been discovered.
Although Baldassarre was an important figure in the
workshop, he was not in charge of production. The
man from a noble family in Florence, ennobled by
Emperor Charles IV, a protégé of Richard II and
Martin I of Aragon, and linked to Jean Galéas
Visconti, was above all a merchant and
entrepreneur. Indeed, the artistic figure of the
workshop was Giovanni di Jacopo, a Florentine
named in a testamentary document of 1395 as
‘maestro de' miei lavori dell'osso’ (= master of my
works in bone). It would appear that he also ran the
workshop in Florence before moving to Venice.
During his career, he teamed up with a number of
collaborators to meet demand, and continued his
work with Baldassarre's descendants after the
latter's death.
Wedding Boxes
First appearing on the artistic scene in northern Italy
in the 3rd quarter of the 14th century, they were
designed to contain precious items such as
jewellery or silks, but were above all symbolic gifts.
They sealed the commitment of marriage, as
indicated by the smooth insignia on which the coats
of arms of the engaged families were painted or
applied.
They were produced in place of French Gothic
caskets, even though they were aesthetically quite
different. Here, bone is used, which was not the
case and Gothic caskets mainly depicted courtly
and gallant subjects, whereas here the iconography
refers to the myths of classical antiquity reworked
through medieval novels or Italian stories.
Artistically, these caskets are more closely related
to a late Hellenistic and Byzantine tradition, with
structural and iconographic similarities. While the
formal structure was not an original ‘invention’ of
the Embriachi workshop, it did boost their appeal.
Despite a certain recurrence in the iconography, it
evolved into a repetitive representation of female
and male figures facing each other. This was
accompanied by a simplification of the costumes
and backgrounds. At the same time, symbolic
figures armed with clubs and shields were placed in
the corners to represent the virtues of women. This
type of production is less expensive. These boxes
are also where the so-called ‘Certosina’ technique
is used. This consists of using small pieces of light
and dark wood, natural or green-painted bone and
horns to create small designs: Greek keys,
chequerboards, chevrons, etc. Some concerts are
entirely decorated with this technique. Some
concerts are entirely decorated without any
figurative plates
Finally, in the third quarter of the 15th century, this
type of box stopped evolving and was no longer
used as a wedding gift but to satisfy a taste for
antiquity.