Firebacks

Description: Rectangular with cavetto curves rising to corners and a ‘portico’ top; fillet edging with bas-relief, alternate regularly spaced semi-circles and triangles inside; two-handled flower vase with acanthus bas-relief, trailing vines issuing from top, with pomegranate and hop(?), descending through handles to base; lion’s head at top; date split either side of vase base.

Notes: The bas-relief edging also appears on other firebacks, suggesting the same pattern maker. The date was probably added separately. Formerly in Dallington, East Sussex. Burstow & Hewett auction, Battle, 3 Apr 2019, lot 1706 (£35).

Copies of this fireback are known.

Inscription: 1662

Description: Pentagonal with a small triangular arch, centre top; twisted rope edging (top and sides); in arch, cross formed of small fleurs-de-lys; row of small fleurs inside rope edging, lower half of sides plain; length of twisted rope each side, parallel to edges, with small fleur terminal at top end; upper centre, rope escarbuncle with fleur terminals between ‘R’ and ‘C’ (both of rope with fleur terminals, ‘R’ reversed); ‘A’ below escarbuncle (also rope with fleur terminals, with cross bar above); fleur cross below ‘R’.

Notes: Twisted rope with fleur terminals is seen on several firebacks with stamps otherwise associated; formerly at Warnham Court, Sussex; illustrated in Gardner 1898, p. 146. The escarbuncle is the principal charge on the arms of the Duchy of Cleves, possibly associating this fireback with the brief marriage of Henry VIII and Anne of Cleves.

Inscription: R A C [inverted triad]

Description: Rectangular with cavetto curves rising to corners and a ‘pediment’ top; fillet edging with low-relief, alternate regularly-spaced semi-circles and triangles inside; two-handled flower vase with gadrooned upper surface and symmetrical flower design in relief below; trailing vines and flowers issuing from top and descending through handles to base; human face at top; second half of date to right of vase base.

Notes: Another version, probably by a different pattern-maker, is dated 1662; a recasting; an earlier casting measures 665mm x 610mm

Copies of this fireback are known.

Inscription: [...] 52

Description: Cavetto-canted rectangle with central pediment; cyma-reversa moulded edging; central pedimented panel, fillet edged, with shield, helm, crest and mantling of the May family; on either side, an incised floral pattern of a stem and six branches, rising from a rectangular, low-relief panel of two images of horsemen; above, the inscription in low relief.

Notes: The arms of May: Gules, a fess between eight billets Or; crest: Out of a ducal coronet Or, a lion’s head gules bezanty; the same armorial stamp appears to have been used on an unnamed iron graveslab in Ticehurst church. The initials are probably those of Susanna May (c1653-1718), heir to Pashley, in Ticehurst, who had married her distant cousin, Sir Robert May, in 1686. The May family had been involved in the iron industry in the 16th and early 17th centuries, but were no longer active a century later. Incised decoration on firebacks is uncommon, the decoration probably having been incised into the pattern board.

Inscription: 17S M02

Arms: May of Pashley, Ticehurst