Desk

Craftsmen seeking to provide a sense of surface movement to furniture sometimes employed the reverse serpentine form in which convex outside surfaces frame a similar concave central section, thereby resembling the oxbow by which two oxen were yoked together.  This imaginative form, rarely used in England, reached its zenith in utilitarian chests and desks made in Massachusetts in the second half of the 18th century.

This desk is made of finely figured imported West Indian mahogany.  The short, powerfully shaped cabriole legs with their sharply pointed knees terminating in a bird's talon tightly gripping a ball were used to support much case furniture made in this area.  The carved pendant fan of the desk resembles those on the drawers of the museum's Frothingham high chest, made in the same area.