The Massachusetts tea table was available with a choice of round, square, serpentine, or scalloped tops. Of these the latter was the most costly, as well as unusual. The Bayou Bend table is clearly influenced by English examples; in fact, were it not for its stationary top and block made from native maple, it could be mistaken for an English table. American tripod tables with spiral carved urns were produced in both Newport and eastern Massachusetts. The sinuous carved feet on this example suggests an attribution to the latter.

Related examples: Nutting 1962, no. 1121; others include Comstock 1954, p. 57; Sack 1969–92, vol. 5, p. 1317, no. P4352; Antiques 123 (February 1983), p. 272; Sack 1969–92, vol. 8, p. 2159, no. P2274.

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.