Slab Table

CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Slab Table
Datec. 1750–1800
Made inPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
MediumMahogany; southern yellow pine, eastern white pine, and yellow-poplar; marble
Dimensions33 × 49 3/4 × 27 in. (83.8 × 126.4 × 68.6 cm)
Credit LineThe Bayou Bend Collection, gift of Miss Ima Hogg
Object numberB.69.67
Current Location
Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens
Philadelphia Stairhall (Upstairs)
Exposé

Explore Further

Department
Bayou Bend
Object Type
Description

Massachusetts Governor John Endicott’s 1665 inventory included “A marble table, In the Hall,” one of the first references to the slab table. Endicott’s table was unusual in either England or America at this time. A group of Massachusetts Early Baroque slate-topped tables comprise the earliest surviving examples that relate to this form. A stone top, or slab, was ideally suited for dining and entertaining, being less vulnerable to heat or liquid than wood. The slab table was produced in Philadelphia by the Late Baroque period, but it was not prevalent until the Rococo. The carved urn ornamenting the Bayou Bend table’s skirt has been interpreted as a Neoclassical prelude, but more likely it was inspired by a Palladian element. 

Related examples: A privately owned side chair, said to have descended in the Fisher family, has an urn carved on its crest rail reminiscent of the one on the table’s skirt.

Book excerpt: Warren, David B., Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1998.


ProvenanceBy tradition Samuel Rowland Fisher (1745–1834), Philadelphia; inherited by his daughter Deborah Fisher Wharton (1795–1888); inherited by her granddaughter Deborah Wharton Barker (Mrs. Edward Mellor, 1854–1943); inherited by her son Rowland F. Mellor (1891–1988); purchased by [Ginsburg & Levy, New York, March 16, 1950–January 21, 1951]; purchased by Miss Ima Hogg, January 21, 1951; given to MFAH, 1969.
Exhibition History
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
[no inscriptions]
[no marks]

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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Slab Table
c. 1760–1800
Mahogany; southern yellow pine, white oak, and yellow-poplar; marble
B.59.82
Sofa
c. 1750–1801
Mahogany; red oak, yellow-poplar, southern yellow pine, white oak, and eastern white pine
B.59.73
High Chest of Drawers
c. 1750–1800
Mahogany; chestnut, southern yellow pine, eastern white pine, and yellow-poplar
B.69.89
scan from file photograph
c. 1760–1800
Black walnut; red gum, Atlantic white cedar, yellow-poplar, southern yellow pine, and eastern white pine
B.69.527
Card Table
c. 1785–1820
Mahogany, satinwood, and unidentified inlay; yellow-poplar, white oak, hickory, and southern yellow pine
B.69.129
Card Table
c. 1755–1800
Mahogany; yellow-poplar, southern yellow pine, white oak, and hickory
B.70.23
Dressing Table
c. 1760–1800
Mahogany; southern yellow pine, yellow-poplar, and Atlantic white cedar
B.58.147
Chest-on-Chest
c. 1760–1800
Mahogany; mahogany, Atlantic white cedar, yellow-poplar, white oak, and southern yellow pine
B.69.74
scan from file photograph
c. 1750–1800
Mahogany; eastern white pine, birch, southern yellow pine, and hickory
B.76.163
Étagère
John Henry Belter
1855
Rosewood and rosewood veneer; black walnut, mahogany, eastern white pine, yellow-poplar, undetermined exotic wood (possibly eucalyptus), marble, and mirrored glass
B.81.9.10
High Chest of Drawers
c. 1760–1800
Mahogany; mahogany, Atlantic white cedar, cedar, southern yellow pine, and yellow-poplar
B.69.75
Tall Clock
Edward Spalding
c. 1765–1785
Mahogany; chestnut, white oak, black cherry, eastern white pine, southern yellow pine, and cherry
B.59.83