Description A WOODEN APOTHECARY CABINET WITH 51 DRAWERS, EDOJapan, Edo period (1615-1868)The apothecary cabinet (kusuri dansu) made of wood and varnished in black. All drawers applied with metal handles and almost all bear an inscribed label used to identify the medicinal herbs that once filled this cabinet.Condition: With extensive wear, scratches, nicks, and small losses, in any case, still in stable condition.Provenance: Family collection of either Felix Tikotin (1893-1986) or his son-in-law Louis (Loek) Borensztajn (1935-2021), Netherlands. Felix Tikotin (1893-1986) was an architect, art collector, dealer, and founder of the first Museum of Japanese Art in the Middle East. He became one of the world's leading collectors of Japanese art, starting at the age of 18, and continued to collect and work as an art dealer in Berlin in the 1920s. In the 1930s Felix Tikotin fled from the Nazis and hid his collection in the Netherlands. After the war, he decided that his collection should be taken to Israel, where in 1959 and with the help of Abba Hushi, who was the mayor of Haifa, The Tikotin Museum of Japanese Art was established. The Museum's collection comprises more than 8,000 items of art and crafts.Weight: 3.3 kgDimensions: 49 x 29.5 x 15 cmApothecary chests were used by doctors and teahouses to store medicines. They are also called hyakumi-dansu ("hundred flavors chest") because of their many small drawers to sort and store traditional medicines. Yet another name for them is hyakume-dansu ("hundred eyes chest") because of the many round handles that look like eyeballs.