Tea Table

CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Tea Table
Datec. 1735–1782
Made inHartford-Wethersfield area, Connecticut, United States
MediumCherry
Dimensions26 × 29 × 20 3/4 in. (66 × 73.7 × 52.7 cm)
Credit LineThe Bayou Bend Collection, gift of Miss Ima Hogg
Object numberB.69.349
Current Location
Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens
Pine Room
Exposé

Explore Further

Department
Bayou Bend
Object Type
Description

Tea drinking gained widespread social acceptance late in the seventeenth century, corresponding with the proliferation of an assortment of vessels deemed appropriate and necessary for the occasion. The tea table’s origins, like the beverage itself, go back to China, a precedent for the form being the Oriental wine table with its raised rim. As early as 1708 a “Tee table” is recorded in Boston, and a few Early Baroque examples, primarily from New York, are known. By the Late Baroque period the form became requisite, and in Wethersfield references to it date from the 1730s. The pleasing simplicity of this example, with its undulating skirt and ogival arch, is indebted to a Salem, Massachusetts, design.

Technical notes: The rails are shaped on all four sides. The top is pinned to the sides and the molded rim is separate. The table retains much of its finish history.

Related examples: Kirk 1967, p. 91, no. 158; Antiques 56 (September 1949), p. 147; Antiques 101 (March 1972), p. 416; Antiques 128 (August 1985), p. 177; Antiques 130 (July 1986), p. III; Antiques 132 (July 1987), p. 96; Antiques and The Arts Weekly, November 11, 1988, p. 20–I; Antiques and The Arts Weekly, July 28,1995, p. S-3. The table’s contours relate it to a group of Hartford-Wethersfield area dressing tables and high chests: Kirk 1967, pp. 48,102, nos. 81, 179; Sack 1969–92, vol. 8, p. 2288, no. P5705; Antiques 136 (December 1989), p. 1204; Jobe et al. 1991, pp. 130–32, no. 47

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, owned by Dr. Ezekiel Porter (1705–1775), Wethersfield, Connecticut, though more scholarship suggests it originally belonged to his son-in-law and daughter, Colonel Thomas Belden (1732–1782) and Abigail Belden; inherited by their daughter Mary (Mrs. Frederick Butler, 1771–1811); inherited by her daughter Abigail (Mrs. James Bidwell, 1798–1832); inherited by her daughter Esther E. Bidwell (1826–1910); inherited by Mary Belden (Mrs. John Parsons, d. 1910), Wethersfield; inherited by her husband, Dr. John Parsons; [Ginsburg & Levy, New York, 1928]; purchased by Miss Ima Hogg, 1928; given to MFAH, 1969.
Exhibition HistoryTheta Charity Antiques Show, Houston, September 13–17, 1989 (LN:89.33)
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
[no inscriptions]
[no marks]

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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Tea Table
c. 1735–1780
Mahogany; mahogany and cherry
B.54.10
Card Table
c. 1820–1830
Grained, painted, and gilded mahogany, and birch; mahogany veneer on eastern white pine with black walnut banding, ash, eastern white pine, cherry, and original brass casters
B.68.31
Table
c. 1710–1750
Cherry
B.69.51
Card Table
c. 1800–1820
Mahogany and unidenfied inlay; eastern white pine and black cherry
B.69.408
Card Table
c. 1820–1825
Mahogany, mahogany veneer, rosewood, and ebony; yellow-poplar, cherry, eastern white pine, and brass
B.68.32
Dressing Table
c. 1740–1800
Cherry; eastern white pine
B.59.70
Sofa Table
c. 1815–1825
Mahogany, mahogany veneer; eastern white pine, yellow poplar, cherry, and mahogany
B.71.106
Pier Table
c. 1825–1830
Mahogany; cherry, tulip poplar, marble, and mirror glass
B.98.13
Two-Drawer Table
c. 1860–1875
Cypress, pine, cherry, and brass
B.2007.22
Center Table
Deming & Bulkley
c. 1825–1835
Mahogany; eastern white pine, cherry, paint, and gilt
B.69.526
Card Table
c. 1735–1745
Mahogany and unidentified inlay; mahogany, cherry, eastern white pine, and spruce with needlework
B.69.406
Stand
c. 1785–1850
Black cherry and unidentified inlay; eastern white pine and cherry
B.69.373