Andiron with cooking pots and a pair of fire tongs c. 1590 - 1596

Editor: So here we have an andiron with cooking pots and a pair of fire tongs, dating back to between 1590 and 1596. It’s unsigned, sitting here at the Rijksmuseum. It feels… strangely industrial for the time, but also wonderfully battered, you know? What stories do you think this thing could tell? Curator: Ah, yes, it does possess that time-worn character, doesn't it? You almost expect the embers to glow as you look. When I see this, I imagine raucous laughter around a crackling fire in a bustling, candlelit kitchen. This andiron, likely forged from iron – you can almost smell the metallic tang even now – was never meant to be precious. These aren’t decorative objects in the modern sense, no art for art's sake. What purpose did they have beyond cooking? Editor: Protection, maybe? Like, keeping the fire contained and stable? Curator: Indeed! Consider the social tapestry woven around that hearth. Meals weren't mere sustenance; they were communal events. Negotiations were had. Tales were told. Bonds were forged as they waited, famished, for the soup. This andiron… was the stage. Almost sculptural, would you say? Editor: Definitely sculptural! Especially with that unexpected dent halfway down. It’s got this fantastic wonkiness to it. And those little rivet details—a rough-hewn beauty, I think. Curator: Yes! Mannerism embraces artifice over naturalism. Did the dent get there on purpose? We'll never know, maybe? It just somehow happened. In either case, it invites us to imagine its creation, or what the cooking space would have been like, almost as clearly as smelling woodsmoke from the grate itself. What does *that* image bring to mind, now? Editor: Just… how useful it looks! Knowing people actually used this—touched it, smelled it—it feels much closer than if it had been behind glass, or untouchable. Curator: Precisely! It lives still! Thank you, now I, too, will think of the scent of woodsmoke every time I visit it!