1625 Fireback With The Alliance Arms Of Claude Legrand And Claude De Fusy (90x83 Cm)

Rare fireplace plate dated 1625, from the 17th century, with the alliance arms of Claude Legrand (1575-?) born in Bar le Duc, ennobled by Charles III of Lorraine for military services in 1595 and Claude de Fusy married in 1593. Their second son Antoine was the line of the barons of Rehainviller, lord of Mont, Finville, Merquine, Grandcourt, Villincourt, St Germain and Moncel and lord vowed of Rosières aux Salines. Plate produced using a waiting plate with typical Cousances les Forges decoration. With its upper corners knocked down, its architecturally shaped ornamentation is adorned with a decor of arcades, decorated with small coins, carried by pilasters and consoles, sheltering the coat of arms of Claude Le Grand inscribed in a triumphal hat carried by a raised greyhound and surmounted by an Inca mascaron from whose mouth emerge two cornucopias, the coat of arms of his wife Claude de Fusy placed on the sinister, conceals the second original greyhound. Three fleurs-de-lys complete its ornamentation. This plaque comes from Bar le Duc. A crack is to be noted in the lower part. Its weight is 119 kg. Blazon: Azure, a fess argent accompanied in chief by a lion passant or, and in base by a gauntlet argent decorated with gold which is of Legrand and Azure, a fess engrailed argent, accompanied by 3 gold cups 2 and 1 which is of Fusy. A plaque listed in the staircase of the Vézelise market halls, the current town hall, in Meurthe et Moselle, also bears the coat of arms of Claude Legrand as well as the date of 1625. Sources: - Nobiliaire ou armorial général de la Lorraine et du Barrois, volume I, 1758, Dom Pelletier, p 465 and p 270. - Mémoires des lettres, sciences et arts de Bar-le-Duc, Volume III, 1894, Armorial des Ecuyers du bailiwick de Bar, p 202, n° 60. Thanks to Mrs Christine Chazeau for her research and her pugnacity. You can visit our site: www.claudeaugustin.com