A Good 19thC Lions Paw Cast Iron Doorstop c.1820-40

Object Description

The good black painted cast iron doorstop crisply cast in the form of a hairy lions paw foot with a rope twist handle and flat back stamped ‘Cross no.96’, the whole surviving from the second quarter of the nineteenth century.

Object History

Unknown.

Object Literature

Although mankind had thought of various ways to keep doorways open prior to Victorian times, the way in which we now expect a door stop to look and function today was down to a 19th century African American inventor named Osbourn Dorsey who came up with the design on December 10, 1878. English craftsmen of the 19th century originated the hairy paw style after seeing what the Romans did with animal feet with excavated ruins revealing hairy paw antiquities.

A lovely object and just as useful today as it was when it was forged.

Object Condition

The doorstop simply shows commensurate wear and slight rusting and is in totally original order.

Object Details