George III Mahogany Dining Table by Morgan & Sanders

• Mahogany - Mahogany is a dense, close grained red-coloured timber from the West Indies and Central America. It was first imported into Europe in the the early 18th century and its use continued through the 19th century. It was popular for furniture making because of its strength, the wide boards available, the distinctive grain on some boards, termed flame mahogany and the rich warm colour of the timber when it was polished.. The "flame" was produced where a limb grew out from the trunk of the tree, and this timber was usually sliced into veneers for feature panels on doors, backs and cornices.
  
  Some terms used to describe mahogany relate to the country from which it originally came, such as "Cuban" mahogany, "Honduras" mahogany etc. However unless the wood has been tested the names assigned are more a selling feature, rather than a true indication of the timber's origin.
• George Iii - George III (1738 - 1820) was King of Great Britain and Ireland from 1760 to 1820.
• Frieze - An architectural term denoting the flat, shaped or convex horizontal surface of furniture, between the architrave and the cornice, usually found on a cabinet or bookcase, or on desks and tables where it may include drawers, the area between the top and the legs. In ceramics, the term refers to the banding, of usually a repeating pattern, on the rims of plates and vases.
• Inlay - Decorative patterns inserted into the main body of a piece of furniture, generally in wood of contrasting colour and grain, though brass, ivory, ebony, shell and sometimes horn have been used. Inlay may consist of a panel of well figured timber inset into a cabinet door front, geometric patterns, or complex and stylized designs of flowers, swags of foliage, fruits and other motifs. As a general rule, in pieces where the carcase is constructed in the solid, the inlay is relatively simple such as stringing, cross banding and herringbone banding. Where more elaborate and decorative work was required veneer was used. Inlay has been fashionable from at least the latter half of the 17th century, when a variety of elaborate forms were developed
• Metamorphic Furniture - An item of furniture, that can be transformed from its apparent purpose to a different purpose. The most common examples are the library chair that can be folded into a set of library steps, and the side table that transforms into a multi-tiered dumb waiter through a series of ropes, pulleys and weights.
• Ebony - Ebony is a close grained timber, black in colour. It has a fine texture which can be polished to a high gloss, making it suitable for venereering, inlay and stringing and its use as solid timber is resticted to small decorative items and ornamental decoration, such as chess pieces and musical instrument parts. The term "ebonised" means "faux ebony", timber that has been darkened during the polishing process to resemble ebony.
• Castors - Wheels, fitted especially to chair legs, couches, tables and some smaller pieces of furniture, to enable them to be easily moved about. The earliest castors were of brass, with shanks fitting into the base of the leg, and the wheels often made of leather. In the late 18th century, brass 'bucket' or 'cup' castors were introduced, either rounded or square, fitting directly over the end of the leg and held in place with screws. The wheels were generally solid brass. Bucket/cup castors continued in use throughout the 19th century and indeed are still made today. In the later 19th century wheels were sometimes made of wood, china, either white or brown, and sometimes of steel.
• Reeding - A series of parallel, raised convex mouldings or bands, in section resembling a series of the letter 'm'. The opposite form of fluting, with which it is sometimes combined. Reeding is commonly found on chair legs, either turned or straight, on the arms and backs of chairs and couches and around table edges in the Neoclassical or Classical Revival manner. Reeding was also used as a form of decoration during the Edwardian period, but it is usually much shallower and evidently machine made.
• Ackermann, Rudolph - Rudolph Ackermann (1764 - 1834) was born in Saxony and is best known as a publisher of decorative coloured prints in London.
  
  His early career demonstrated an entrepreneurial bent that was to lead to his success as a businessman in London.
  
  At the age of 15 he was apprenticed to a saddler, and three years later moved to Dresden to train as a (horse-driven) carriage designer.
  
  He later lived in Switzerland, France and Belgium for short periods, before moving to London in 1787.
  
  He set up a successful business as a coach designer and decorator and in 1795 diversified his interest to include publishing and bookselling. His first decorative hand-coloured prints appeared in 1797. His output included political and social caricatures by leading artists of the day.
  
  From 1809-1829 he published "Ackermann's Repository of Arts", an illustrated annual British periodical which covered arts, literature, commerce, manufactures, fashions, and politics, and had great influence on English taste in fashion, architecture, and literature.
  
  His most ambitious venture was "The Microcosm of London". Which was completed in 1810 in collaboration with leading artists of the day, and contained 104 large folio hand-coloured aquatints.
  
  In the following years he published further volumes, again working with artists such as William Pyne, established branches of his business in several Central and South American cities, and set up a publishing business for his son, also called Rudolph, one of his nine children in Regent Street, London. This business was taken over by Rudolph Junior's son Arthur, and was later renamed Arthur Ackermann Ltd. and was trading as fine art dealers until 2011.
  
  His death in 1834 was preceded by a stroke in 1833 which left him partly paralysed.
• Important - Important is a word used in the antique trade to indicate an object should be ranked above other similar objects, and is therefore more valuable.
  
  The object could be considered important because it is by a famous designer or maker, has been shown at a major exhibition, is of exquisite workmanship, is rare or is a "one-off", was made for an important patron, and so on.
  
  Even further up the pecking order are objects that are described in catalogue descriptions as highly important or extraordinarily important.

This item has been included into following indexes:

• tables, large dining - twin, triple and four pedestal dining tables 85
• tables, period or style - Georgian 159