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| MAIN GLOSSARY | GLOSSARY OF wood |
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WALNUT
Used in Europe since the 16th century it is rich golden brown in color. It is one of the most highly prized woods for furniture. In the 17th and Early 18th centuries it was imported from France to other parts of the world. The dark timber of the black walnut (J. nigra), found in hardwood forests in the eastern half of North America, and of the Persian, or English, walnut (J. regia), native to W Asia, is unusually hard and durable and is valued for furniture, interior paneling, gunstocks, musical instruments, and other uses. Black walnut has been the foremost cabinet wood of North America since colonial times. The closer-grained English walnut, usually sold as lumber under the name Circassian walnut, is widely cultivated in Southern Europe and the Orient and has been introduced with great success into California, now the major producing area of the world. The butternut is also timbered; the wood is softer than that of the black and English walnuts.

WOOD CARVING
As an art form, includes any kind of sculpture in wood, from the decorative bas-relief on small objects to life-size figures in the round, furniture, and architectural decorations. The woods used vary greatly in hardness and grain. The most commonly employed woods include boxwood, pine, pear, walnut, willow, oak, and ebony. The tools are simple gouges, chisels, wooden mallets, and pointed instruments. Although they were universally one of the earliest art media, wood carvings have withstood poorly the vicissitudes of time and climate. A few ancient examples have been preserved in the dry climate of Egypt, e.g., the wooden statue of Sheik-el-Beled (Cairo) from the Old Kingdom. In Europe wood carving was highly developed in Scandinavia, and examples have been preserved of 10th- and 11th-century work. In England the Gothic period produced extremely fine carving, especially on choir stalls. Although the Puritans destroyed much of this, enough has been preserved to show its beautiful workmanship. In France, wood carving was also a part of religious art, and there the carved altarpieces were especially notable. Italian wood carving flourished during the Gothic period in Pisa, Siena, and Florence, as well as in the southern monasteries; during the Renaissance it remained an adjunct of Italian artistic development. Many of the 15th- and 16th-century artists in Germany worked in wood, creating monumental sculptures and altarpieces. Fine examples were also created in Flanders and Spain. After the Renaissance wood carving went into a slight decline. It had a revival in the early 18th century when Gibbons in London carved for Sir Christopher Wren's buildings. In colonial America fine ships' figureheads and many other pieces now considered important folk art were executed in wood.

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