DUMMY BOARD FIGURES .sx By MICHAEL CONWAY .sx DUMMY boards shaped as life-size figures were decorative and amusing accessories in the Georgian house and in the garden too .sx Cut from wood and painted , they vividly , even startlingly , resembled richly attired men and women , colourful birds and domestic animals .sx Good-looking housemaids gave life to dreary passages ( Plate 172A ) ; the entrance hall might shelter a shepherd and shepherdess , sometimes with sheep ; romping children might hide an empty fireplace ( Plate 171D .sx ) Dummy board figures appeared in England during the 1660s as fire screens :sx a silhouette of a man or woman might be cut from thick , heavy wood and painted so that he appeared in a naturalistic attitude before the fireplace .sx The artists were usually second-rate portrait painters .sx The earliest record of such a painted figure is engraved in the frontispiece to the Compleat Gamester ( 1674 ) , where a dummy board fashionably stands erect before the fire , feet wide apart , with a drinking glass held in his hand , screening a company of card players from the heat of the blaze .sx The Georgian dummy board figure was designed for ornament only and was made from much thinner wood .sx A projecting ledge extending from shoulder to shoulder at the back kept it 6 inches from the wall and was attached to it by means of a pair of wrought-iron hooks and staples .sx This position and the figure's feather edges caused a life-like shadow to be thrown against the wall and secured a three-dimensional effect .sx Careful placement was essential , for the figure might be painted full face or three-quarter face- rarely in profile .sx In an alcove , such as at a stair bend , the dummy board was secured into an erect position by means of a pair of wooden supports cut in the shape of shoes projecting four or five inches to the front , and with heels projecting to the rear .sx Holes in existing examples show them to have been screwed down from the heels .sx These colourful figures added interest to early Georgian homes , and in the days of George =3 stocks of those painted by sign-board artists were displayed by the innumerable Mayfair furnishing stores .sx Regency dummy boards lacked the colourful elegance of earlier work , but Victorians reverted to Georgian styles , in greater brilliance and with some carving in relief .sx GLOSSARY .sx Animals and birds :sx rooms might be decorated with dummy board figures of tabby cats .sx An early Victorian series of cats was covered with black velvet instead of paint , and large amber beads were used for eyes .sx Friendly dogs were popular for the parlour , and fierce-looking animals for the entrance hall , apparently ready to fly at any unauthorized intruder .sx Brightly painted parrots and macaws perched high in the room appeared very realistic to the visitor below .sx Deer , sheep and pigs might stand in well-selected outdoor positions .sx Artists :sx until the 1760s professional portrait painters decorated the majority of dummy board pictures .sx Their work is recognized by life-like poses and vivacious expressions .sx Many specimens appear to have been portraits .sx Then came a statute making it illegal to suspend sign-boards over the highway , and the great trade in sign-board painting was ended .sx Dummy board pictures were thereupon painted by shop sign decorators who for the most part worked in Harp Alley , Shoe Lane , London .sx The existence of identical dummy board figures cut from a master template and painted with similar figures illustrates the change to a style of work approaching mass production .sx Boards :sx the wooden boards upon which images were painted were at first in oak or pitch pine .sx In the eighteenth century beech , pearwood and mahogany were alternatives .sx Those intended for outdoor use were cut from 1-inch teak which neither warped nor shrank under the stress of changing weather conditions .sx Outlines for dummy board figures were cut from single boards measuring about 2 feet wide .sx From the 1770s thickness was halved .sx For comparison it may be noted that late eighteenth-century tables ( q.v. ) measuring 3 to 4 feet in height were between 1/4-inch and 3/8-inch in thickness .sx The planks on most seventeenth- and eighteenth-century dummy boards have shrunk a little , revealing vertical tongue-and-groove joints .sx Canvas covered :sx because the built-up boards tended to open with shrinkage of the wood some dummy boards were covered with painter's canvas , the fabric glued to the feather-edged board .sx The back might be covered with canvas also and painted brown .sx Elizabeth =1 costume :sx dummy boards painted in elaborate Elizabethan attire were popular with early Georgians and again in the mid-nineteenth century .sx The early series was almost invariably painted by portraitists , possibly adapted from engravings as minor accessories were correctly depicted .sx The face might be that of the purchaser or a member of his family .sx Feather edges :sx the wide , sharply cut bevelling surrounding the rear edge of the profile at an acute angle .sx This gave a clear and life-like effect to the shadow thrown upon the wall .sx Fireboards :sx these date between the 1750s and the 1790s .sx They measure 3 to 4 feet in height and enlivened hearth interiors during summer months when the burnished steel portable grate , fender and fire-irons were oiled and laid away until autumn .sx The chimney was closed and the hearth recess cleaned of its soot and made colourful with massive ornaments , such as lidded urns in porcelain , huge jars displaying flowers and foliage , or terrestrial globes .sx Dummy board representations of these might be used , particularly vases of flowers .sx Alternatively the entire fireplace opening might be masked by a fireboard painted with an urn overflowing with flowers .sx As yet another alternative small figures might be used , such as matching pairs of costumed boys and girls , the boys often riding stick hobby-horses .sx A board of this kind might stand upon a plinth of mahogany or gilded beech , plain or elaborately carved , but usually the lower edge was set into a heavy block of oak about 5 inches thick which might be carved or japanned in red .sx Fire screens :sx dummy board pictures were originally designed for this purpose :sx stout , heavy articles measuring up to 6 feet in height and cut from 1 1/2 inch oak or pitch pine , feather edged , set in weighty blocks enabling them to stand upright without assistance .sx The heat of the fire must have warped the woods , the table joints opened , and the oil paint flaked away .sx Highlanders :sx kilted Scotsmen were produced in large numbers to stand as trade signs outside the doors of tobacco and snuff shops .sx Lady at her toilet :sx this series appears to be the work of a single Georgian artist .sx They wear early seventeenth-century dress , including the period's enveloping white apron bordered with lace , and hold hand mirror and brush to dress their waist-long hair .sx ( Plate 171A .sx ) Outdoor figures :sx life-size figures so painted and arranged that visitors unexpectedly confronted with them were startled into believing that they were living realities .sx Red-coated soldiers stood on guard in mansion porches , on hotel stairs , in tea gardens and pleasure grounds and at tavern doorways ; sailors standing , or dancing the horn pipe , were favourites in the gardens of waterside taverns .sx Country innkeepers favoured dummies of jugs and glasses , or dishes of onions , radishes , bread and cheese .sx Pedlars and women hawkers were favourite outdoor figures early in the nineteenth century .sx Painting :sx the artists drew his outline upon a smooth-surfaced board of seasoned wood .sx At first each was individually designed , but from the 1760s templates might be used .sx The table was then sawn to shape and the edges sharply bevelled .sx Two or three washes of boiling linseed oil were then applied , followed by a rubbing down with distemper or powdered white lead mixed with parchment paste .sx The colours were painted over this , the distemper soaking up excess oil and thus increasing the brilliance of the paint .sx This radiance when new was enhanced on fine work by burnishing , particularly of the gold and reds .sx The final result was protected with varnish .sx Unless it can be seen that this process was used , a board should be looked upon with suspicion .sx Regency :sx by the nineteenth century dummy board figures had become less showy , typical examples including women hawkers , ballad singers , pedlars , organ grinders with monkeys and , later , knights in armour .sx ( Plate 172B .sx ) Reproductions :sx these were made in the mid-Victorian period and again in the 1920s and 1930s , the latter often costume portraits copied from well-known paintings and standing with the aid of hinged brackets as on an easel .sx These modern dummies have a so-called 'antique finish' to simulate age .sx Soldiers :sx these were depicted in the uniform worn by Grenadiers of the Second Regiment of Foot during the reign of George =1 .sx An eighteenth-century engraving of the interior of the Old Chelsea Bun House illustrates a pair of Grenadiers and an equestrian dummy board , displayed on brackets above the doorway , each throwing a shadow on the wall .sx Pairs consisting of a Grenadier and a housemaid have been recorded .sx These soldiers are about 7 feet high with mitre-shaped hats about 18 inches high .sx They are always found with their feet 18 inches apart , then the attitude of attention :sx the 'heels together' position dates from the time of the Prussian influence on the English army in the 1750s .sx A variety of red-coated soldiers of the late eighteenth century have been recorded , many of them in the 'stand at ease' position .sx Tables :sx the contemporaneous name given to the boards constructed from tongued-and-grooved units joined and prepared ready for painting .sx Trade card :sx an example of the 1760s is in the Banks Collection , British Museum .sx This was issued by John Potts , the Black Spread Eagle , King Street , Covent Garden , London , and illustrates a dummy board figure of Elizabeth =1 , describing such figures as 'Ornaments for Halls , Stair-cases and Chimney Boards .sx At lowest prices' .sx Victorian :sx in addition to reproductions of Georgian types , a series was made with the surface carved in relief and painted .sx These were mounted on four-wheeled square pedestals 12 inches high .sx Women with brooms :sx this was a stock pattern .sx Many still remain , identical in size , shape and pose , always wearing white or baize aprons , but with varying faces and dress details .sx They are shown holding soft brooms , the long bristles bound to a round stock with three ornamental turned knops above .sx They represent ladies of the house laudably domesticated rather than housemaids .sx Because of their dress such dummy boards have been attributed to the 1630s .sx A more reasonable attribution is to the second half of the eighteenth century , dress having been copied from early Stuart sources ( Plate 171B .sx ) JELLY MOULDS .sx By JULIET SANFORD .sx FOR centuries jellies have figured importantly among English desserts , particularly upon festive occasions .sx At the feast following George Neville's installation as Archbishop of York in 1466 , the huge dessert included '3,000 Parted [particoloured] dishes of jelly and 4,000 Plain dishes of Jelly' .sx Each jelly was tabled individually in an earthen jelly pot except on the high table where silver was used .sx Immediately after the invention of flint-glass in 1676 , readers of The Accomplisht Cook , by Robert May , 1678 , were directed to 'serve jelly run into little round glasses four or five to the dish' .sx These were plain footless bowls with folded lips and were sold at 1s 6d a dozen under the name of jelly mortars .sx Georgian jellies were served in deep , cone-shaped glasses and eaten with long small-bowled spoons .sx The mid-morning snack of jelly was known as 'long spoon and jelly' .sx Early in the Georgian period individual moulds were made in white salt-glazed stoneware .sx Large jelly moulds were unknown to Mrs. Hannah Glasse whose Complete Confectioner , 1753 , instructed her readers to pour jelly 'into what thing you please to shape it in and when cold turn it out .sx If it sticks dip your basin in hot water' .sx Moulds to turn out jellies large enough to serve several individual helpings appear to have been introduced by Josiah Wedgwood in his celebrated queen's ware .sx In the nineteenth century these were accompanied by moulds in Britannia metal , copper , Bristol stoneware , and flint enamel ware .sx GLOSSARY .sx Bristol stoneware :sx jelly moulds were not made in brown salt-glazed stoneware as its granulated 'orange peel' surface made it impossible to turn out the jelly .sx