A Secret Hidden for 250 Years: Inside the Mystery of a Rare Gold Cabinet | Sotheby’s

0:02 I couldn't believe my eyes. I had seen a black and white image of it, but I had no idea of the colors, of the fineness, [music] even of the charming size of the perfect work of art. The most fascinating part of this is that it has a concealed compartment holding the secret of its own identity. I'm Alexandra Alexandra, I'm the head of gold boxes and objects of vertu here at Sotheby's, >> [music] >> and today I have the honor to talk to you about this most amazing object. It's a gold-mounted hardstone snuffbox made in Dresden in about 1770 by the court laboratory Christian Gottlieb Stiehl.

0:47 All of these hardstone boxes, [music] they're called a Stein Kabinett, a stone cabinet. It's rare because [music] Stiehl in his very long career between 1708 and 1792 only made 10 [music] of them. Also, it's incredibly rare to have a stone cabinet in this condition. And [music] one of Stiehl's specialties was to mount very thinly cut [music] hardstone panels ajour, so they're held in place by these tiny gold wires alone rather than inset on a prepared [music] ground. Cuz when you think about it, one of these tiny, not even a millimeter wide cloisons has to hold both the hardstone panel on the left and on the right, which requires extreme technical mastery.

1:32 The surface is so polished that wearing [music] gloves is actually a bit more risky. In fact, all of these snuffboxes, they were always meant to be handled by people, meant to be admired in the round, and they were meant to be touched. [music] It was made in a context of scientific interest and beauty and also sort of more regional natural interest because most of the stones were mined in the Ore Mountains [music] in Saxony, which is where the box was made. The maker, Stiel, had rented quarries in Saxony to find the most suitable hard stones for these boxes. But then, this is not just the most beautiful box, it also has a very cool secret, which if you look very carefully, there's one of these old balls that has a tiny outer frame, and

2:19 if you push that button, a secret sliding compartment appears. It also still contains the original booklet, a handwritten booklet that lists all the stones that are used on the lid, sides, and the base of the box. According to the cover, it says, "Catalogue de toutes sortes de pierres qui se trouvent en Saxe." So, all the hard stones that occur in Saxony. The booklet is both written in French, obviously the official court language, and in German, which is incredibly rare. It's honestly really, really cool, because if you look at this box and you think, "Oh, well, that's a very nice stone. I want to see which number 42 is." You go to number 42 on the couvercle,

3:05 and you can see, "Oh, it is agate from Freiburg." And then, number 19, which I actually found [music] quite intriguing, because it's quite unusual to have a white stone on boxes at that period. So, let's just check what that could be. 19 [music] is an opal from Eibenstock. It's all very, very well thought [music] through, and nothing's left to chance on this box. Only 10 of his boxes are recorded, so four are in museum collections. [music] The six others are in private hands. This one is from the collection of Maurice Tempelsman, the last companion of Jackie Kennedy [music] Onassis, and it hasn't been seen since '60s. It hasn't actually been in the public eye for much longer.

3:51 It was sold at Hôtel Drouot in Paris in 1906, >> [music] >> and then it's listed once again with a black and white image in 1935. So, it was a real real real treat because it is so much better than you could have ever imagined from print. What's also really interesting is that we have these graduated tiny blue flowers, and they're actually forget-me-nots. So, that's [music] the kind of flower that carries quite rich associations in Germanic law, a symbol for faithfulness [music] and loyalty, and is quite often used on boxes given to parting lovers or ambassadors or box that was presented on occasion [music] where loyalty mattered. To me, really, this is not just a small beautiful treasure. This is really intricate crossover between cabinet of

4:37 [music] curiosities and interest in minerals and art and beauty and technical mastery, obviously. It transcends classic collecting [music] categories, and this is perhaps most beautiful evidence of that period.