Sampler with figure in landscape

1794

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Nabby Townsend

Sampler with figure in landscape

Nabby Townsend

Sampler with figure in landscape

1794

Physical Qualities Natural linen, silk embroidery threads, 16 1/2 x 12 in. (41.9 x 30.5 cm.)

Credit Line Gift of Mrs. Francis White, from the Collection of Mrs. Miles White, Jr.

Object Number 1973.76.351

Nabby Townsend's charming sampler displays the characteristics found in samplers worked by girls from Middlesex County, Massachusetts, between 1790 and 1805. These samplers are generally vertical in format, with wide, deeply arcaded borders on three sides and center sections enclosed within saw-tooth borders. Within this is usually a single alphabet and a verse as well as pictorial elements. The dismal tone of her verse contrasts with the pleasant, naively conceived scene Nabby Townsend chose to embroider on her sampler, depicting a girl seated within a landscape filled with birds and trees. It is typical, however, of the moralistic sayings found in late 18th- and 19th-century samplers, which often preach the transience of youth and beauty and the certainty of death. [Inscription]: "The fairest Flowers will soon decay Their fragrance lose and splendid hue So youth and beauty fade away And vanish like the morning dew" "Nabby Townsend's work wrought in the Eleventh year of her age. 1795"

Baltimore Museum of Art by gift, 1973; Nancy Brewster (Mrs. Frances White) by inheritance; Virginia Purviance Bonsal (Mrs. Miles White, Jr.).

BMA, 'The White Collection,' March 19 - June 2, 1974, no catalogue.

Anita Jones, BMA, 'The Accomplished Stitch: American Samplers and Silk Embroideries from the Collection,' 5/11-7/20/97, no. 5.

Betty Ring, "Girlhood Embroidery: American Samplers and Silk Embroideries 1650-1850", New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993, p. 77, caption to fig. 76.

Inscribed: Embroidered at top of sampler is an alphabet and poem: 'ABCDEFGHIJKLMOPQ/RSTUVWXYZ'; 'The faireft Flowers will foon decay/ Their fragrance lofe and splendid hue/ So youth and beauty fade away/ And vanifh like the morning dew'; Embroidered at the bottom of the sampler: 'Nabby Townfend's work wrought/ in the Eleventh year of her age./ 1795' (Note: The 'f's represent the archaic form of 's' used in the inscription.)