While there are several useful books on the market for identifying objects, including those previously mentioned, I don't know of one that really describes a wide variety of objects.

An excellent book for furniture is Furniture & Furnishings by Antony White and Bruce Robertson that I purchased at Barnes & Noble a few years ago.  While it does help you identify types and styles of furniture, it also identifies elements of furniture, such as balloon back (chair), scroll leg, and bead and reel molding.  Many of these elements are used in decorative arts.

You're  right, Lucy, ads in various antiques magazines and entries in museum catalogs often have great descriptions of objects.  Fortunately, I began my career working with curators who were great at descriptions, so I picked up quite a bit reading their descriptions as well as paying attention to the aforementioned sources.  I'm trying to pass on this knowledge to others, but a single source would be great.

Maybe this is a project that registrars and curators could tackle?


Martha Battle Jackson
Registrar
North Carolina Historic Sites
4620 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, NC  27699-4620
(919) 733-7862, ext. 232; Fax: (919) 733-9515
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