A rare ‘Black Forest’ fox stick stand

A rare ‘Black Forest’ fox stick stand, the dark-stained wood (probably linden wood) naturalistically carved as a fox dressed as hunter, shown on his hind legs with a rifle and a game bag slung across each shoulder, the straps crossing over his stomach, wearing a deerstalker, waistcoat and gaiters and with his tail protruding under his coat, with inlaid glass eyes. Swiss, circa 1880.

Footnote:  For many years carved wooden pieces such as this were wrongly thought to have come from the Black Forest in Germany.  However, we now know that a wide variety of carvings were actually produced in the Swiss Alps as extensively researched by Arenski, Daniels and Daniels, in their publication ‘Swiss Carvings, The Art of the ‘Black Forest’ 1820-1940’ Woodbridge 2005.  It is interesting to note that in Chapter 6 ‘Hallstands’ there are numerous stick stands featuring dogs and bears but none similar to this fox.