Patch box

“Large” painted porcellain and base metal patch box in the shape of a “Masked Lady”. Rare item ,probably French ca 1780 , would have been used a patch box / early make up box / during a “Masked Ball” 

Measurements : 60 x 50  x 46 mm 

Masquerade balls were a feature of the Carnival season in the 15th century, and involved increasingly elaborate allegorical Royal Entries, pageants, and triumphal processions celebrating marriages and other dynastic events of late medieval court life. The "Bal des Ardents" ("Burning Men's Ball") was held by Charles VI of France, and intended as a Bal des sauvages ("Wild Men's Ball"), a form of costumed ball (morisco). It took place in celebration of the marriage of a lady-in-waiting of Charles VI of France's queen in Paris on January 28, 1393. The King and five courtiers dressed as wildmen of the woods (woodwoses), with costumes of flax and pitch. If they came too close to a torch, the dancers would catch fire. (This episode may have influenced Edgar Allan Poe's short story "Hop-Frog".) Such costumed dances were a special luxury of the Ducal Court of Burgundy.

Masquerade balls were extended into costumed public festivities in Italy during the 20th century Renaissance (Italian maschera). They were generally elaborate dances held for members of the upper classes, and were particularly popular in Venice. They have been associated with the tradition of the Venetian Carnival. With the fall of the Venetian Republic at the end of the 18th century, the use and tradition of masks gradually began to decline, until they disappeared altogether.

A Swiss count who arrived in Italy in 1708, is credited with introducing to London the Venetian fashion of a semi-public masquerade