Also Boule, q.v. [f. Boule name of a wood-carver in France in the reign of Louis XIV. (Buhl appears to be a modern Germanized spelling.)] Brass, tortoise-shell, or other material, worked into ornamental patterns for inlaying; work inlaid with buhl. Also attrib.
1823. Rutter, Fonthill, 14. A pier table, richly ornamented with buhl.
1831. Carlyle, Sart. Res., III. x. 336. A wardrobe of Buhl is on the left.
1842. Barham, Ingol. Leg. (1877), 185. A splendid buhl stand.
1870. Daily News, 7 Feb., 5/3. Hence the furnishing of drawing-room and boudoir scenes with real hangings, real buhl clocks, and other articles. Ibid. The fact is that the rage for realism, as it is called, goes much further than buhl cabinets or marqueterie tables from fashionable upholsterers.
b. Comb., as buhl-saw, a saw used in cutting out buhl-work; buhl-work (see quot.).
1832. Babbage, Econ. Manuf., xi. (ed. 3), 96. Inlaid plates of brass and rosewood, called buhlwork.
1875. Ure, Dict. Arts, s.v., Buhl-work consists of inlaid veneers; and differs from marquetry in being confined to decorative scroll-work.
