Antique Handmade Book Box with Interior Portrait carved mirror 12 1/4" x 8 7/8"

12 1/4" x 8 7/8"

NH families someone from these parts would surely recognize

and one can still make out the year

under glass in a simple wooden frame: 17 1/4

There is some wear to the wood in one spot on the interior lip of the bottom

Antique Handmade Book Box with Interior Portrait carved mirror 12 1/4" x 8 7/8"I rarely meet a book shaped thing I don't like, and this feels like something of an example of not judging a book by its cover! I'm thinking there may once have been a picture of some sort adhered to the outside cover, which shows a bare spot surrounded by red paint now and perhaps that picture functioned as a sort of counterpart to the portrait print of woman in large plumed hat inside; my guess is that it turned this book box into a c. 1800 French