AN INDIAN SILVER FILIGREE CASKET
 

Early 17th century

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With a domed lid, filigree flower-shaped feet, handles and lock.

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H. 7 x W. 11 x D. 6.5 cm

Weight: 358 grams

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Note:

Silver filigree from the East became very popular in Europe in the early 17th century. Initially, most of it was imported into Europe through Lisbon coming from Goa. Later in the 17th and the early 18th century most silver filigree from the East arrived in Amsterdam or London, coming from the Dutch East Indies/Sumatra, India/Karimnagar and China/Canton. Particularly the VOC, Dutch East India Company, brought back many artefacts made in silver filigree in the Far East for royal collectors in the West. Louis XIV of France, Elector Frederick William of Brandenburg, Amalia van Solms

in the Netherlands and the Russian Tsars, Peter and Catherine the Great, all began their own collection of silver filigree. Since the VOC could not and did not obtain these objects in Goa, they had to find them elsewhere and they did, mainly in West Sumatra where silver filigree is still made today. In the course of the 18th century, the craze for filigree died out and very little of it was still ordered in the East.

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