[BUTTONS]. - Lot 8

[BUTTONS]. Set of nine buttons "à la Buffon". [circa 1785]. - 9 knobs (diameter approx. 36 mm), brass support and hoop, one knob with a crack in the glass and one knob with the bottom of the decoration partly broken. Allio, Le Bouton au fil du temps, p. 91. These buttons are called "à la Buffon" because they contain natural elements such as insects, plants or shells under a glass. Around 1780 in France, like King Louis XVI, society at the time was keen on the natural sciences, and Buffon's writings remained famous. "Fantasy also reigns in button trimmings and buckles. There are buttons of every kind [...]; one goes so far as to set specimens of beetles under the domed glasses of the buttons." (Babeau, Paris 1789). Among these nine buttons, two feature a small green beetle, another a butterfly, two shells and four plants. A rare set.