Antique Chair-Help me ID it

No Nick, a solid wood back isn't unusual, depends on the chair type. It could be a hall stair, could be a Wainscot.

Here's a starting point. The two chairs from the left are 'wainscots' the chair far right is a hall chair ... are any of these chairs similar to the chair at the convent??
http://www.netcomuk.co.uk/~mckinley/temp/chairs1.jpg

Hi Nick, not sure if you mean the back is small or the overall chair itself is small .. 'like a child's chair.'

The legs on both these chairs are original. This is normal, that the back legs of a chair will be quite plain and in fact, not matching the front legs. The back leg on the hall chair in my photo, is known as a sabre leg (curved) the normal back leg one would find in most all (four leg) hall chairs and on most dining chairs.

I don't think you are going to find a webpage or even a dealer in real life that exclusively confines themselves to hall chairs. Nor am I aware of any books exclusively on the subject.

The hall chairs, as the name would apply, resided in the hallway, (either front hall, back hall or indeed both), of the B I G house, the estate house, landlord's house and places such as your convent or other church estate houses, like the Church of Ireland rectory for example. The hall chair came in sets, the size of the set depending on the status of the house and the quality of the back (and chair itself) again depending on the status of the house and the owner. The back decoration of the chair being more or less a statement on the wealth and status of the original owner, many times incorporating a coat-of-arms, although, not always was the coat-of-arms a real one, many times merely appearing as a pseudo coat-of-arms, especially for the 'new money' owner.

Their function was simply as a waiting chair for visitors to the house, strictly no upholstery of any kind, an all solid seat and back. The lack of upholstery or textile was a matter of hygiene, as the personal cleanliness of the many visitors to the B I G house could not always be guaranteed ..... fleas/mites and other beasties don't normally live or reside on solid wood. ;>

As you are in the Dublin area (I am in the North - Co. Antrim) getting some more information and help with the chair shouldn't really be a problem. Get yourself down to Francis Street (Dublin 7) there you'll find literally dozens of good antique shops and dealers, better still (if possible) take the chair with you down to Francis Street, show it to anyone of the dealers and all the questions will be answered.

As a single hall chair, it will not *normally* have a high value. As they are a rather uncomfortable chair they serve little function today in a real domestic environment, other than for their decorative or historical appeal. It's really only sets of hall chairs that command the high prices, the bigger the set the better, set sizes can range, from a mere six up to 20+ and more ... unless .. the convent (the house) has a local history and/or the original owner was a prominent person. If the house in question has real age, then obviously it wasn't always a convent, check that out. I am assuming the hall chair belongs to the house in question, which is a reasonable and safe assumption ... the coat-of-arms on the back of the chair may (or may not) be of some assistance to the chair's original origins.

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Most hall chairs are uncomfortable to sit on and, in my experience of them, comfort seems to be inversely related to quality, due to the carving in the back.

There's an interesting section on hall chairs in 'Objects of Desire - Design and Society 1750-1980' by Adrian Forty. Forty notes that during the course of the nineteenth century, various systems evolved to formally emphasize the distinction between servant and master. The introduction of uniforms for housemaids c. 1860, for example, and the trend towards houses designed with entirely separate servants quarters and independent circulation systems so that the servants could carry out their work largely out of sight of their employers. Nineteenth century furniture catalogues also included austere furniture (now container fodder) specifically designed for servants quarters.

Forty goes on to say:

'The one space in the Victorian house that was used by both master and servant was the hall. Masters and their visitors passed through the hall, when entering and leaving the house, while servants were required to be there to receive guests and take their hats and coats. Because of their combined use by servants and masters, halls needed a special type of furniture, particularly of chairs. Although people of the master's class might pass through the hall, they were unlikely to linger or sit down; the only people likely to spend long enough in it to need to sit down were inferiors, whether servants, prospective servants waiting for interview, or, as the American author of one nineteenth-century book on the decoration of the home puts it,'messenger boys, book agents, the census man, and the bereaved lady who offers us soap.' Hall chairs would be seen by the master and his guests and thus had to conform to the standards of beauty found elsewhere in the house, but there was no reason for them to be any more comfortable than the rest of the furniture provided for servants. The same American authority on decoration explained:

'As visitors of this class are the only ones who will sit in the hall, considerations of comfort may be allowed to yield to picturesqueness, and any chair or bench that gives us that will serve....'

The conventional hall chair was usually made of oak or mahogany, with an elaborately carved back and turned legs, but was distinguished from drawing-room or dining-room chairs by it's plank seat and lack of upholstery; it was consistent with other furniture for servants in it's austerity, but its ornament made it quite unlike anything found below stairs. It was a hybrid designed to be seen by one class and used by another.'

Cheers,

Jane