"Cuir boulli" Work.
Most of the decorated leather work of that period, examples of which are not very difficult to secure, was made by the cuir boulli process. The leather, after being boiled down to a pulp and salt and alum added, was then moulded to any desired form, the decoration being imparted in the process.
The Victoria and Albert Museum is very rich in fine examples, and a description of some of the typical pieces there may serve as a guide to collectors hopeful of including some objects moulded by this process among their household relics.
The work was carried on at Cordova and other places for a long period, some of the museum examples dating back to the fifteenth century. There are cases for holding what were then rare books and manuscripts, and a remarkable scribe's case with a red cover has loops on either side to which a cord was attached. The scribe was an important personage in commercial and private correspondence in the days when even rudimentary education was by no means general.
In the same collection is a leather box for holding a knife and fork; on the outer case is a medallion, in the centre of which is a representation of the two spies returning from Canaan with a large bunch of grapes. There are also cases which have once held wine bottles, some ornamented in colours; indeed, the stamped, cut, and embossed designs of the cuir boulli work were frequently enriched by the addition of red, yellow, and gold.
There are some specially interesting examples of Italian work, representing a period covering nearly the whole of the Renaissance. In this connection there are pilgrim bottles of yellow glass encased in wonderful leather covers, cut and embossed. There are leather snuff boxes with trellis-work ornament and scroll borders, one very interesting piece being varnished to imitate tortoiseshell. There are also some attractive toilet objects, evidently antique presentation pieces. One is a most elaborately cut and incised comb case, on the exterior of which is the motto or legend: "DE BOEN AMORE." In the same collection there is a fine leather case for a cup or tankard. Such cup cases are not uncommon, many being the receptacles for treasured heirlooms. Perhaps one of the most noted examples of the use of embossed and decorative leather work is the ancient case of stamped leather intricately foliated, a highly decorative work of art in which is enclosed that remarkable goblet of legendary fame known as "The Luck of Eden Hall."
Tapestry and Upholstery.
Stamped and embossed leather work is very conspicuous in domestic upholstery. In very early times the leather work, hung upon the wall in panels, took the place of more modern wall-coverings, and it was truly lasting. Much of the Cordovan leather is still very fresh in appearance, although several centuries old. Some of the panels hanging on the walls at South Kensington look remarkably fresh, and, richly decorated in colours, many of them are very effective. A special branch of this work was that devoted to the decoration of chair backs; stamped leather work for upholstery has been used in this country to a large extent, and some of the large oak chairs are still upholstered in the original ornamental leather produced by boiling the hides by a special process, so that the material could be readily moulded. In more modern times, however, the decoration is effected by embossing and stamping, supplementing such ornament by the use of an immense quantity of small brass nails, which are arranged in geometrical patterns or straight lines, oftentimes names and dates being included in the design.
In this connection also are screens of painted and gilt leather, chiefly of eighteenth-century manufacture. There is a good deal of this leather work to be found in old houses still, and much of it is capable of improvement by properly cleaning and touching up here and there so as to revive the old colours. Here and there hung up as wall decorations may be seen leather-covered boxes which were specially made to hold deeds; in the older examples there is a large circular piece below the narrow box, arranged so that the seal could hang in its proper position from the end of the deed; they were, of course, in common use before the days of safes and other methods of preserving parchments and property deeds. One in the Victoria and Albert Museum is stamped on the exterior with the description of the deed it originally contained, the inscription commencing thus: "THE GRAUNT OF HEN: THE 5 TO THE ABBOT OF RADING."