Rare Antique Georgian Irish Linen Damask Banqueting Tablecloth, Scotland, 1818
Item History & Price
| Reference Number: Avaluer:64756 | Featured Refinements: Banqueting cloth |
| Type/ Features: Damask woven | Colour: White |
| Sub-Type: Tablecloths | Product: Table Linens |
| Style/ Origin: Irish | Material: Irish Linen |
This is enormous, and very old. I'll add something of its provenance after the description. The measurement written on the cloth is 4 yards, i.e.12 feet long by 7 feet wide and that is what it is - a large banqueting tablecloth. It probably survived because it would only have been used for very special occasions - and as far as I can tell, its owner wasn't short of table linens!
NB although I've assumed an Irish origin, given the date and provenance, this could have been S...cottish linen. I simply don't know.
The pattern is floral and ferny with extraordinary garlands round the border and cornucopias in the middle. I have photographed it as best I can - but the design itself has a 'fuzzy' quality that I only find in ultra old linens of this type - possibly hand loomed? The cloth is in surprisingly good condition. The surface is a bit 'bobbly' here and there, but this is good quality, and still bright white linen. It is clean, and soft. Professional pressing and perhaps starching would give it the characteristic sheen.
As well as the measurement written on the cloth, there are the initials EH, the name Eliza Hagart written elsewhere and, intriguingly, a date that looks as though it could be 1818, or 1820 which makes this a very old cloth indeed.
These tablelinens were part of a huge collection of old Irish or possibly Scottish linen damask tablecloths andnapkins which had been stored away in an old Ayrshire country house – althoughI don’t know which one. I have been working my way through them, but still have some left. I'm hoping to sell them this year.
There was an Eliza Ellice, whose name is woven into some of the napkins and cloths, born in 1817 or1818. But I think this cloth belonged to her parents: Miss ElizabethStewart and Thomas Campbell Hagartof Bantaskine, Stirling. Elizabeth – a celebrated beauty of that day - was the daughter of Thomas Stewart of the ‘Glasgow field’, who was a Calico Printer – a lucrative trade in those days when brightlyprinted cottons were much in fashion. She was sometimes referred to as ‘thebeautiful Miss Stewart of the Field.’ Ihaven’t been able to find out exactly what the ‘field’ was, but it may havebeen a Bleach Field, given the textile connection. The industrial revolutionwas well under way in the west of Scotland and some of the older tablecloths - including this one, I think - must have belonged to the beautiful Miss Stewart who became Mistress Hagart. She would have been Eliza Hagart in 1818 or 1820 if her daughter was born around that time.
I'll include a full provenance as far as I know it, with the cloth.
NB although I've assumed an Irish origin, given the date and provenance, this could have been S...cottish linen. I simply don't know.
The pattern is floral and ferny with extraordinary garlands round the border and cornucopias in the middle. I have photographed it as best I can - but the design itself has a 'fuzzy' quality that I only find in ultra old linens of this type - possibly hand loomed? The cloth is in surprisingly good condition. The surface is a bit 'bobbly' here and there, but this is good quality, and still bright white linen. It is clean, and soft. Professional pressing and perhaps starching would give it the characteristic sheen.
As well as the measurement written on the cloth, there are the initials EH, the name Eliza Hagart written elsewhere and, intriguingly, a date that looks as though it could be 1818, or 1820 which makes this a very old cloth indeed.
These tablelinens were part of a huge collection of old Irish or possibly Scottish linen damask tablecloths andnapkins which had been stored away in an old Ayrshire country house – althoughI don’t know which one. I have been working my way through them, but still have some left. I'm hoping to sell them this year.
There was an Eliza Ellice, whose name is woven into some of the napkins and cloths, born in 1817 or1818. But I think this cloth belonged to her parents: Miss ElizabethStewart and Thomas Campbell Hagartof Bantaskine, Stirling. Elizabeth – a celebrated beauty of that day - was the daughter of Thomas Stewart of the ‘Glasgow field’, who was a Calico Printer – a lucrative trade in those days when brightlyprinted cottons were much in fashion. She was sometimes referred to as ‘thebeautiful Miss Stewart of the Field.’ Ihaven’t been able to find out exactly what the ‘field’ was, but it may havebeen a Bleach Field, given the textile connection. The industrial revolutionwas well under way in the west of Scotland and some of the older tablecloths - including this one, I think - must have belonged to the beautiful Miss Stewart who became Mistress Hagart. She would have been Eliza Hagart in 1818 or 1820 if her daughter was born around that time.
I'll include a full provenance as far as I know it, with the cloth.
