Wenzel Jamnitzer (c.1508-1585), Silver writing box

Elaborate boxes for the storage of writing implements have a history going back into the Middle Ages, but this one is given a very fresh look by the application of the fashionable style rustique. In this case, direct casts of ten tiny creatures – a grasshopper, cicada, molluscs, beetles, a frog, a crawfish, two lizards and a mouse – provide the handles for the boxes and lids, while further tiny flora and fauna festoon the sides of the box. Jamnitzer produced much of his best work for members of the the House of Habsburg: Archduke Ferdinand II particularly valued the amazing verisimilitude of this technique.