NARRATOR:
Tudor monarchs surrounded themselves with furniture and art from Europe and beyond, and their richest courtiers followed suit.

This carved and inlaid French table was used in Hardwick Hall, one of the great country houses of England. It would have staggered visitors with its opulence, whimsical design, and technical innovation.

ELIZABETH CLELAND:
The Sea Dog Table is just one of those incredibly rare survivals.

NARRATOR:
Curator Elizabeth Cleland.

ELIZABETH CLELAND (continuing):
We have very little bespoke furniture from the sixteenth century surviving, so this gives us a sense of what we’re missing. It’s a glorious combination of color and detail and texture. When you look up close you can see there are a few traces of the original gilded silver ornamentation. There’s the color of the inlaid marble set in the tabletop.

NARRATOR:
Perhaps most striking, though, are the so-called “sea dog” beasts supporting the tabletop.

ELIZABETH CLELAND:
They’ve got these scaly reptilian bodies, fishy fins, and then these very endearing dog’s heads. None of them are the same; some of them have their mouths open, some of them have their mouths closed. And they’re completely mythical, fantastical beasts.

But I think what’s also great about this table is not just the fantasy and the inventiveness of the design. Perhaps the most incredible fact of all is that the whole thing can dismantle into seventeen different elements to be easily handled and transported and moved from room to room. Because that really was a key element of life in a Tudor great house or palace—this ability to move from space to space with the court and with the celebrations.

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