Movables

A word frequently used to describe mobile furniture or other articles not fixed to a building.

Mule Chest

A chest standing on a plinth in which sometimes three or four drawers were provided. It was a piece of furniture of the seventeenth century midway between a simple chest and a chest of drawers.

Muller

A small cone-shaped vessel with handle in copper or other material, an ordinary feature in old ingle-nooks, used for heating liquor in the fire when making mulled ale or wine. The pointed form made it easy to push the vessel deep into the embers where it remained in an upright position.

Muniment Chest

See Chest.

Musical Glasses

See Harmonica.

Nail Heads

Nails with plain or ornamented heads, or bosses of copper, brass, or other metal, for securing the leather or upholstery of chairs, have been used in England from the early periods of furniture. Their employment for this purpose was probably copied from Italian and Spanish models. In later periods the nails were sometimes so arranged as to form a pattern.

Revocation Of The Edict Of Nantes

This action by Louis XIV., in 1685, was of great importance to the arts and crafts in this country, since it had the effect of driving some thousands of the best French workmen here, with their tools, designs, and methods of work. Among them were cabinet-makers, carvers, and textile workers.

Necking

See Collar.

Nest Of Drawers

An early name for the Chest of Drawers.

Nicking

A notched or gouged ornament frequently found on oak furniture of the seventeenth century.

Nonsuch Furniture

"A type of furniture popular in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in which inlay was used to form perspective views especially of the Palace bearing the name. The surface of early Nonsuch furniture was usually flat without mouldings." The most characteristic and familiar examples were chests, but although they bear the generic name of "Nonsuch Chests," it does not necessarily follow that they all depict the picturesque palace, crowded with towers and pinnacles, which Henry VIII. built and Barbara Villiers destroyed.

Notching

See Nicking.

Nulling

In wood carving a small projection or recession from the surface, like a boss, bead, etc., or a series of them, having an appearance similar to the repousse or chased work on metal. When worked along the edge of any feature, such as a table-top, it is called a gadroon.

Oak

Some three hundred species of oak are found in the northern hemisphere, but in England practically only one distinct species is found, the Quercus robur, and it is the wood from this tree which was used for the massive furniture of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and later. Mr. Percy Macquoid has fixed the Oak period in England as from 1500 to 1660. Although the vogue for walnut began in the Restoration, oak was still used during the eighteenth century. It was also a favourite groundwork for veneers and marquetry, and was used for certain parts such as drawers of cabinets, tables, etc.