The cradle might have been passed over as just another fussy piece of Victoriana with overtones of the brown furniture market for saleroom habitués.
However, they should have been alerted of its potential significance due to the quality and imagination of its craftsmanship.
The piece contains a technicolour variety of New Zealand timbers and for the second time this year, eyes in the Australian saleroom will be looking across the Tasman for stirrings of interest.
The cradle could also be of interest to the London trade for potential resale – if only, given the maker's background, to the Bavarians - as previous offerings from the same cabinet maker are believed to have been.
It is in a style described as Cinquecento Gothic that surely would also be of interest – dare I say it – to people like Blairman's of Mayfair who have been leaders in the market for High Victorian furniture.
The cradle was made by Johann Martin Levien in 1861. An article in the Illustrated News of the World of May 4 that year says so.
Writing in the journal of the Furniture History Society in 2012, a Victorian member Mr Michael Green who secured it, says that in 20 years of collecting and restoring hidden treasures he had never heard of the name of the maker and little did he know that "the name would soon become one which I would live and breathe, as no other treasure could remotely compare” to the cradle.
The cradle contains a dozen different timbers and is veneered predominantly in Totara, Levien's favourite timber.
Levien went to New Zealand in 1841 when he was a 20 year old and filled ships with New Zealand timbers on a mission funded by the New Zealand Company.
Back in Britain he set about furnishing the homes of European aristocracy. As Green sees it, Levien placed New Zealand timbers on the map. He wrote a 25 page pamphlet in 1861 extolling them.
The cradle could be argued not to be a piece of New Zealand furniture in so far as furniture made from Honduras or Cuban mahogany or Brazilian rosewood is not Honduran, Cuban or Brazilian.
But the piece is a remarkable early exercise in the crafting of New Zealand timbers. Its appearance on the market which will tax New Zealand museum curators' judgment, and possibly funds, heavily in the light of the recent purchase, for coincidentally, about the same amount of money of a medal consigned by a NSW vendor to a Sydney auction.
The medal had been presented to a New Zealand Maori chief on a visit to Australia in 1806.
The serendipity of the purchase at Joel's might not be matched by the current availability of funds.
Both Te Papa national museums in Wellington and Auckland combined to buy the medal. New Zealand museums do have representative examples of the maker's work.
New Zealand however is said now to be a land of milk if not honey as the dairy industry prospers like never before in new Asian markets. Babies drink milk don't they? So there might be a chance for corporate sponsorship.
New Zealand's Royalist instincts may also be provoked by the recent royal visit. The cradle appears to be a commissioned piece for one of the many of Queen Victoria's brood, her fifth child, Helena.
Private interest however might be limited by the mood it conjures up. The neo-Gothic component suggests only a Damien with a 666 on his skull would be particularly happy in it. Any other child might die of fright.
Mr Green however describes it as a piece “of utter majesty.” Its exposure should help stir interest and membership in historical societies which have tended to be static at best.
The cradle is decorated with an ivory frieze and two ivory portrait medallions and hopefully is such an old piece that the CITES regulations governing international trade in ivory have no bearing on it.
The ivory is the work of the 19th century Milanese master Fernando Pogliano. Mr Green says the portraits feature similarities to the royals favourite artist Winterhalter's royal paintings and show Bertie, Prince of Wales and Princess Royal, Vicki, the Queen's eldest daughter.
The estimate was $2000 to $3000 in Leonard Joel's sale of European and Australian decorative arts including the collection of the late Charles and Ethel Titchener on May 25 2010. It was described as "A 19th century burr walnut ebonised and ivory inlay cradle. The oval cradle with foliate and grotesque inlay frieze suspended by scroll and shell carved dual faceted column tapering supports united by a conforming cross stretcher, scroll feet, porcelain castors." It measures 116 by 24 by 48 cm
It is not known how it came to Australia although Titchener is a well known name in the antique trade.
Those associated with the earlier consignment to Joel's must be fascinated by its re-appearance, if not already alerted by the article in the Furniture History Society journal.
