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Dutch Louis XVI Contra-Bakbarometer



Dutch Louis XVI Contra-Bakbarometer

A mercury barometer in a particularly beautiful cabinet, decorated in a late Louis XVI style.
The housing is decorated with eight panels of "verre églomisé" (reverse mirror painting). Most of these panels, as well as the glass pane of the door, are surrounded by piping of ebony and satin wood in marquetry work. The églomisé panel in the hood shows an image of the "all-seeing eye".
The tympanum, with its protruding center part, is topped with a carved vase decorated with laurel garlands hanging from either side. The door is flanked by black polished columns with plinths and capitals in fire-gilded brass.

At the bottom finely carved finials connected by a bow and garland of laurel. The door is equipped with a trend indicator on the right-hand side. The scale plates (dials) behind the door are made of silver-plated brass. The center tube, like the counter tube, shows a division in Inches combined with the so-called "36-scale". In addition, the center tube has a division in Rhineland inches and a scale in "Lb Amst" (Amsterdam Pounds) indicated as “Pressure of the Atmosphere on a square Rhineland Foot". The counter tube has a magnification of 1: 7 and is placed in a very different - and never previously documented - way. This is because the tube runs through a bend behind the plates so that the mercury column is invisible. Only the liquid column on the front can be seen. In this way a symmetrical arrangement of the columns was created, with the very long alcohol thermometer in the middle, which has a distribution with scales in degrees Fahrenheit and Réaumur.

The special placement of the counter tube and the beautifully crafted case with the “verre églomisé” panels make this barometer an exceptional piece of museum quality.

Dutch Louis XVI Contra-Bakbarometer
Price on request
Provenance
Fontijn Antiek, Purmerend 2006
Private Dutch collection
Period
1802
Material
Oak frame veneered with mahogany, ebony and satinwood, verre eglomisé
Signature
Solaro & Butti, 1802
Dimensions
140 x 39 x 15 cm

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