Sackville, the 5th Earl of Yarborough The property of Sackville George Pelham, the 5th Earl of Ya

Sackville, the 5th Earl of Yarborough The property of Sackville George Pelham, the 5th Earl of Yarborough, d.1948. Sackville George Pelham, 5th Earl of Yarborough, MC (17 December 1888-7 February 1948) was a British peer and soldier, known as Lord Worsley from 1914-1926 and Lord Conyers from 1926 until his accession to the earldom in 1936. Pelham was the second son of Charles Pelham, 4th Earl of Yarborough and his wife, Marcia. In 1910, he became a Second Lieutenant in the 11th Hussars and initially fought as a lieutenant in France during World War I before being promoted to the rank of captain in 1916. During the war his elder brother, Charles, was killed in action and Sackville assumed the former’s courtesy title of Lord Worsley. After the war, he was awarded the Military Cross and retired from the Army in 1919 when he married Nancy Brocklehurst (a niece of Lord Ranksborough). On the death of his father in 1936, Sackville inherited the earldom; in the same year he commanded the Nottinghamshire Yeomanry as a Lieutenant Colonel, being posted to Palestine at the outbreak of World War II. On returning to Britain in October 1940, the ship carrying the Earl and Countess of Yarborough came under enemy fire and was sunk. Although most of the passengers and crew survived, the Earl contracted respiratory problems which contributed to his early death in 1948 at the age of 59. A Rare Chinese Imperial qiangjin and tianqi Red Lacquer Altar Table. Qing dynasty, 17th/18th century, 156.5cm wide, 63cm deep, 88.5cm high. Decorated in red, brown, black and gold. The rectangular top finely incised to depict a large central panel of two confronting phoenix amidst scrolling peony flowers, leaves and tendrils. The panel is bordered by forty-one flying bats, the whole enclosed by a design of further flowers and foliage with a cockerel-headed mythical beast to each corner, all within a key fret edge. The frieze is decorated with a band of panels containing bats and swastikas above a pattern of bats, cloud scrolls and shou characters; the reverse, sides and legs with similar designs. A modern plate glass top. Provenance: Sackville, 5th Earl of Yarborough. The Earl used this table to display the fine green jade water buffalo and gilt stand from the Earl’s collection, which was sold in these rooms in May 2009. The Earl’s will contains the following excerpt: To my dear elder daughter, Diana Mary, the Red Lacquer long table and the settee to match, which stand in the front hall at Brocklesby, and the antique Chinese green jade buffalo in the same room... Paper collection label to the underside. Catalogue note: Qiangjin is a decorative technique in which the incised outlines of the design are etched, and filled in gold, and tianqi (filled in) where the different colours of the lacquer are used for decorative effect against the coloured ground. For details of the history and development of this technique, cf. The Luxury of Chinese Lacquer, Littleton and Hennessy, March 2010 Introduction. The decorative design used is particularly auspicious. Terese Tse Bartholomew in her Hidden Meanings in Chinese Art states that, ‘The phoenix is the emperor of all birds, and like the qilin, it appears only in times of peace and prosperity. It is believed that the phoenix’s appearance in China augurs the emergence of an able ruler or the arrival of a great man, for it appeared when Confucius was born. The phoenix is the motif for the empress of China, ornamenting her crown as well as her clothing….. Phoenix (feng) and peony (fuguihua) = may there be wealth, rank and good fortune (fugui jixiang). The phoenix dallying with the peony is an auspicious design (fengxi mudan, fengchuan mudan). When the king of birds is paired with the king of flowers, together they augur great blessings.’ Cf. Imperial Furniture of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Classics of the Forbidden City, pp.152 & 155, nos.172, 175 and 176 for related examples; see also Soame Jenyns, & William Watson, Chinese Art II, p.238, no.176, The Collection of Lord and Lady Fairhaven; and a related pair of open armchairs in the Victoria and Albert Museum. See also, Chinese Furniture, Selected articles from Orientation 1984-2003, p.343. and The Minor Arts of China IV, Spink & Son Ltd, p.15, no.5 for a pair of kang tables decorated in this technique.