F51: Rare 18th Century Bone Geislingen Figural Chess Set

King 8cms, note seahorse knights, fine highlighting including eyes and original case

The chessmen with the original polychrome decoration, one side on pink or red stained bases, the other side on bases left natural, kings and queens as European monarchs,
bishops as courtiers wearing hats, knights as sea-horse, rooks as raised turrets, pawns with floral knops and ball finials, in a pine presentation/display box with a sliding lid.

Reference to similar set at auction in London sometime ago

Some background on Geislingen : GEISLINGEN, a town of Germany in the kingdom of Wurttemberg, on the Thierbach, 38 m. by rail E.S.E. of Stuttgart. Pop. (1905) 7050.

It has shops for the carving and turning of bone, ivory, wood and horn, besides iron-works, machinery factories, glass-works, brewing and bleaching works, &cloth.

The church of St Mary contains wood-carving by Jdrg Syrlin the Younger. Above the town lie the ruins of the castle of Helfenstein, which was destroyed in 1552.

Having been for a few years in the possession of Bavaria, the town passed to Wurttemberg in 1810.
See Weitbrecht, Wanderungen durch Geislingen and seine Umgebung (Stuttgart, 1896).

Reference to related 18th century dress and hats

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