Tiny Carved Wooden Skull Paper Knife greyhound plate dated 1883-84

dated 1883-84

produced by Gerstendorfer Bros New York

Text on each dish identifies the characters and their professions: Guignol himself

perhaps the man with moving arms most of all

I have a soft spot for old folky inlaid frames like this

Tiny Carved Wooden Skull Paper Knife greyhound plate dated 1883-84I find this rather a haunting little carving, I assume meant to serve as a letter opener, and certainly with well more than a hundred years on it I have to think it has opened some letters bearing pretty sad news. The skull itself is tiny, but reads very clearly as a skull, which I've shot with some magnification to get a better sense of its details, which make it look a bit more crude than with viewed by the eye alone. Pretty amazing. 4" long; skull