Firebacks

  1. 146

    hastings_029.jpg
    780 x 570 mm
    Image subject to copyright

    Description: Arched rectangular shape; cavetto moulded edging; shield, helm, crest, supporters, mantling and motto of the Corporation of the City of London; initials split by crest; date split at ends of motto.

    Notes: Shield: Argent, a cross gules, in the first quarter a sword in pale point upwards of the last; crest: on a wreath argent and gules a dragon's sinister wing argent, charged on the underside with a cross throughout gules; supporters: on either side a dragon argent charged on the undersides of the wings with a cross throughout gules; motto: Domine Dirige Nos - Lord Direct Us; the earliest illustration of the arms in this form was in 1609, but their use is older.

    Copies of this fireback are known.

    Inscription: F W / 16 DOMINE DIRIGE NOS 59

    Arms: Corporation of the City of London

    Manufactured: in 1659 possibly in the Weald area of England.

    Current location: Hastings Museum and Art Gallery, Hastings, East Sussex, England.

    Museum number: 952.51.53 (part of the Hastings Museum museum group)

    Citation: Hodgkinson, J. S., 2010, British Cast-Iron Firebacks of the 16th to Mid-18th Centuries (Crawley, Hodgers Books).