Firebacks

Description: Arched rectangular with curved shoulders; cavetto-moulded edging (top and sides) with twin scrolls on inside corners, and scalloped bottom edge; armorial; shield (32 quarters), mantling, supporters (bull and crowned lion), coronet, motto, 2 helms and crests (a bear’s head erased and ducally gorged, and a bear and ragged staff).

Notes: The impaled arms appear to be those of the Earldom of Huntingdon. The crests are of Hastings and Dudley, suggesting they are of Henry, 3rd Earl (c.1535-95), and his wife, Katherine (1548-1620), daughter of John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland. Henry Hastings inherited the earldom in 1560 so the fireback probably dates from between then and 1595, when he died. This is an incomplete casting, the full version of which includes a bottom panel with a repeated guilloche design. Christie's Masters and Makers Sale, South Kensington, 30 Nov 2010, lot 516 (£4,375).

Copies of this fireback are known.

Inscription: IN VERITATE VICTORIA (illegible, but verified on other castings)

Arms: Hastings, earl of Huntingdon, impaling Dudley