Other examples of fifteenth century Italian carving, such as the old
Cassone fronts, are picked out with gold, the remainder of the work
displaying the rich warm color of the walnut or chesnut wood, which were
almost invariably employed.

Of the smaller articles of furniture, the "bellows" and wall brackets of
this period deserve mention; the carving of these is very carefully
finished, and is frequently very elaborate. The illustration on page 51 is
that of a pair of bellows in the South Kensington collection.

[Illustration: Carved Italian Mirror Frame, 16th Century. (_In the South
Kensington Museum._)]

The enrichment of woodwork by means of inlaying deserves mention. In the
chapter on Ancient Furniture we have seen that ivory was used as an inlaid
ornament as early as six centuries before Christ, but its revival and
development in Europe probably commenced in Venice about the end of the
thirteenth century, in copies of geometrical designs, let into ebony and
brown walnut, and into a wood something like rosewood; parts of boxes and
chests of these materials are still in existence. Mr. Maskell tells us in
his Handbook on "Ivories," that probably owing to the difficulty of
procuring ivory in Italy, bone of fine quality was frequently used in its
place. All this class of work was known as "Tarsia," "Intarsia," or
"Certosina," a word supposed to be derived from the name of the well-known
religious community--the Carthusians--on account of the dexterity of those
monks at this work.[6] It is true that towards the end of the fourteenth
century, makers of ornamental furniture began to copy marble mosaic work,
by making similar patterns of different woods, and subsequently this
branch of industrial art developed from such modest beginnings as the
simple pattern of a star, or bandings in different kinds of wood in the