As I told you in Wednesday's blog entry, I purchased, last Sunday part of a very large collection of pewter. The above items are two of the pieces I purchased.
They are this weeks MYSTERY ITEMS.
The one on the left (in some ways a very rare item indeed to have survived) is just under four and a half inches high and just under six inches across the upper rim/ brim. The one on the right is probably too easy to guess. It is just under six and a half inches high (to the top of the rather unusual barrel shaped knop. They are both (as stated) of pewter, and both English. Their purpose and date please ? As a clue the one on the left is probably slightly the earlier of the two, but they are of much the same period. Good guessing.
First!
ReplyDeleteI think the one on the right is a tobacco jar - quite early, poss late 17c.
Well done Rog. You are quite right. I is a tobacco jar.
ReplyDeleteSorry. IT is a tobacco jar. I isn't.
ReplyDeleteI agree Rog, but I would guess a little later, say 1710-1730. More usually seen with an acorn finial.
ReplyDeleteThe footed bowl is a little more difficult to specify, but possibly a barbers suds-bowl or an apothecary's mortar, although I suppose pewter to be a little on the soft side for such heavy work.
Might the bowl be a cook's salt cellar of the early Eighteenth century?
ReplyDeleteI knew the right one was a tobacco jar, but I'll go later than Mr Rog, how about 1776?
ReplyDeleteNot sure about the item on the left. It looks like a mortar ?Made around 1748?
Is the other item a spitoon then?
ReplyDeleteThe item on the right, which Rog spotted immediately as being a tobacco jar, is, of course, just that, a tobacco jar. Nea (as is becoming usual) got the nearest to the date of it, which I would think, is about 1790 (certainly within ten or so either way- and that of course puts it just nicely within Nea's dating).
ReplyDeleteMaggie got nearest to the item on the left's purpose, by guessing it to be a spitoon (although I prefer the term 'cuspidor' Mag)- it isn't, but may well have been used as such. It is, in fact a CHILD size (which is where the rarity comes in) liner for a commode chair. In other words - a child's potty. This one, too, dates from the late 18th century - say 1770- 1790.
There was a very famous Italian, Renaissance painter, who possibly got his name from painting the early pottery versions of this item. He was, of course, Pottichelli............ Oh all right - I'll stop now ..... slinks off, sniggering quietly.
Sorry - misspelt that bad pun - should have been Potticelli - referring, of course to Sandro Botticelli, 1445 to 1510.
ReplyDelete