Object of the Day: A Georgian Page-Turner

Crafted of thin maple, this page-turner dates to the late Eighteenth or early Nineteenth Century during the reigns of King George III and King George IV. The page-turner is inlaid with exotic woods to form a Greek key pattern which frames a mythological scene. Items such as this were used to turn the pages of manuscripts to avoid dirtying them with fingers. The pointed end of the page-turner served as a paper knife to separate pages that had not been cut. Often pages in a manuscript or in a book were bound and delivered uncut on the edges and needed to be sliced in order to be read.

My guess is that the decorative scene represents the Greek myth of Prometheus who was punished by Zeus by being bound to the rocks where an eagle ate his liver which would grow back—only to be eaten again, day-after-day. Not the most cheerful image, but very nicely inlaid.

I love objects such as this. Sure, we have paper knives now and some of them are very pretty. But, who thinks about having a “page-turner” to keep their books clean? Ah, but how many people out there think about books at all? I guess this is the Georgian equivalent of the little cloth that one would use to wipe off an iPad.