An unusual James I joined oak coffer, West Country, dated 1614


Having a quadruple-panelled hinged lid, the front also with four panels, each carved with a different flowerhead framed within a lozenge, and with a rosette to each corner, the two central panels respectively carved and pitch-filled with the initials 'E S' and the date '16 14', the top rail carved with stiff-leaf nulling, the front stiles and muntin-rails with guilloche, all carving lightly highlighted with punched-decoration, twin-panelled ends, the front and sides with scroll-profiled plain spandrels, 157cm wide x 57.5cm deep x 69.5cm high, (61 1/2in wide x 22 1/2in deep x 27in high)
|Three pieces of paper of antiquarian interest are pasted to the underside of this coffer's lid. The first is a partially mutilated leaf from a broadsheet in Welsh, apparently an historical poem, the title beginning 'Hanse' which translates as 'History', which was printed (according to the legend at the bottom of the page) in 1699. The second is a doggerel verse concerning the controversy of the Seven Bishops, at its foot the drawn figures of a bird and a trident-like fleur-de-lys. The third is a modern transcription of the second. The Seven Bishops were a group of Anglican bishops who defied James II by opposing his Declaration of Indulgence issued in 1688. The Declaration, not the first to be issued in the late seventeenth century, granted broad religious freedom in England by suspending the insistence on conformity to the doctrine of the Church of England. It allowed people to worship in their own homes or chapels as they saw fit, and removed religious oaths as a requirement of taking up public office. In May 1688, the Bishops of Ely, Peterborough, Chichester, St. Asaph, Bristol and Bath and Wells, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, asked to be excused from allowing the Indulgence to be read in their churches and, as a result, were tried for seditious libel (since their petition had been printed in London). In June, to the great embarrassment of the King, they were found not guilty. Despite their trial, five of the bishops remained loyal to James II after the Glorious Revolution and lost their bishoprics as a result. The presence of this verse in support of the Seven Bishops alongside a verse printed in Welsh, might indicate that the chest's owner in the late 17th century was a supporter of William Lloyd, the Bishop of St. Asaph, grandson of David Lloyd of Henblas, Anglesey. The chest is earlier than these events and how the two relate is not entirely clear. The plants carved to the front of the chest are (reading proper right to proper left) a carnation (or possibly a leek), a Tudor-type rose, a lily or fleur-de-lys, and a marguerite or daisy.