A Rare and Important Carved Oak Overmantel of Large Proportions, attributed to a Newcastle Workshop of Dutch Carvers, circa 1630, with a moulded cornice and vine-carved frieze over a central panel of Royal Arms flanked by panels on each side depicting Orpheus and Orion, all between stiles with standing figures personifying the four parts of the world, each carved and each named Africa, Asia, Evropa and America, 17th century and later, 372cm by 124cm

The two carved panels of Orpheus and Orion are similar to a set of prints designed and engraved in Cologne and dated 1602. This exact overmantel is referenced and illustrated in Anthony Wells-Cole's book Art and Decoration in Elizabethan and Jacobean England, pg.188, pl.309. Photographed in situ at Hunwick Hall in County Durham and listed as "whereabouts unknown", the overmantel was inherited by the Yorke family c.1900, and thus by descent. The overmantel is similar to a carving formerly at Clervaux Castle, Croft-on-Tees, North Riding of Yorkshire, see pg.189, pl.312