Published on the occasion of an exhibition at the J. Paul Getty Museum focusing on the conservation of the Victoria and Albert Museum's Mazarin Chest, from March 3 to May 24, 2009, this is the first English translation of Jesuit Filippo Bonanni's eighteenth-century treatise, considered the most important and comprehensive early study of Chinese lacquer in Europe. Bonanni relates various authors' attempts to understand and analyze the composition of...