Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015 https://archive.org/details/oldenglishplatee00crip_0 OLD ENGLISH PLATE. Frontispiece ( see p. 2S9). ©lb ©ngltsl) -plate, ECCLESIASTICAL, DECORATIVE, AND DOMESTIC: ITS MAKERS AND MARKS. By WILFRED JOSEPH CRIPPS, M.A., F.S.A., AUTHOR OF “COLLEGE AND CORPORATION PLATE,” “ OLD FRENCH PLATE,” ETC. THIRD EDITION, REVISED AND ENLARGED. WITH 104 ILLUSTRATIONS, AND 2000 FACSIMILES OF PLATE MARKS LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET. 1886. \_All rights reserved.'] BY THE SAME AUTHOR. OLD FRENCH PLATE. Furnishing Tables or the Paris Date-Letters and Fac-similes of other Marks. With Illustrations. 8 vo. 85 . 6d. “Mr. Cripps is the author of the best— indeed the only trustworthy- book on English plate. That book has taken its rank as the authority on the subject. The one before us will, we believe, be equally valued, and will be most useful to every one who takes an interest in the civic heraldry of the continent .”— Notes and Queries. TO C. OCTAVIUS S. MORGAN, F.B.S., E.S.A.. WHOSE OWN WORK FORMS THE MOST SIGNIFICANT PART OF THIS VOLUME, TO WHOSE AID THE REST OWES ITS CHIEF INTEREST, (Liu following Jlages ARE WITH VERY SINCERE REGARD INSCRIBED. PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. In committing a Third Edition of this Handbook to the press, it is only necessary to say that the general use made of “ Old English Plate,” both by the trade and the public, has encouraged the Author’s best efforts to make it as accurate and complete as possible. With this object he has carefully incorporated into this edition the result of the more recent researches that have been made not only by himself, but by many fellow-labourers who find an interest in old English silver-work, ecclesiastic or secular. Special thanks for valuable notes are due to Mr. J. H. Buck of New York; to the Author’s friends, Mr. J. E. Nightingale, Mr. R. S. Ferguson, the Hon. Harold Dillon, and Mr. W. H. St. J ohn Hope ; and to his constant helper, Mr. T. M. Fallow. A great deal of the new information which appears in the following pages must be attributed to these and the other correspondents, to whom the Author owes so much, and whose help he cannot too cordially acknowledge. viii Preface to the Third Edition. For new wood-cuts also the Author is indebted to Mr. Ferguson, Mr. Nightingale, and Mr. Fallow ; as well as to Her Majesty’s Education Department, the Society of Antiquaries of London, the Royal Archaeological Institute, and the Yorkshire Archaeological Society. W. J. C. Cirencester, 1886. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. More than twenty years have elapsed since Mr. Octavius Morgan first drew attention to the halhmarks upon ancient English plate and the interesting information to he obtained from them. Mr. Morgan’s papers and tables have long been out of print, and have so completely retained their value as the best authority on the subject, that a very general demand for a new edition has arisen. The Author has accordingly undertaken the preparation of the present volume, not without the promised help of the eminent antiquary upon whose work it is based ; hut the additions which have been made to Mr. Morgan’s original papers are so large that the New Edition is almost a new book. These additions include the greater part of the chapters upon Scotch, Irish, and Provincial hall-marks, besides those upon old English plate, ecclesiastical and domestic. Much of the information now published for the first time as to ancient provincial plate and its marks, has been collected by the Author, and is added in deference to a suggestion in the Quarterly Review of April 1876, that “ this is the direction which future enquiry ought to take.” The illustrated chapters and fac- similes of old plate-marks are in- tended to enable the reader to identify the specimens that come under his notice by their fashion as well as by the hall-marks they hear, and enlarge Mr. Morgan’s little treatise upon hall-marks into a more or less complete Handbook for the collector of old plate. With this object, the best authorities have been consulted to correct or cor- roborate the results of the Author’s personal research, and the illustra- tions have been carefully arranged, so as to make this portion of the volume a useful practical guide for reference purposes, rather than a description of examples well enough known already. It has been found impossible to give authority for every detail, or X Preface to the First Edition. to distinguish between the original work of Mr. Morgan and the newly added portions ; if therefore the critical reader will be good enough to take the simple course of attributing all that appears to be most valuable to Mr. Morgan and the rest to the present writer, the latter will be more than satisfied with any share that under these circumstances may be left him. It remains for him to acknowledge with gratitude the free access which has been permitted to every public and almost every private collection of plate in London and the Provinces, and to every record which seemed likely to be of service. The help of the Goldsmiths’ Company, and their clerk, Mr. Prideaux, must be specially dwelt upon, and also the assistance afforded in various ways by the other great City Companies, many Cathedral Chapters, and the Wardens and Assay-Masters of every provincial Goldsmiths’ Hall. Much information as to York and Newcastle plate has been kindly collected for the Author by Mr. T. M. Fallow, and many valuable notes have been contributed by Mr. A. W. Franks, Professor A. H. Church, Mr. W. D. Waterhouse of Dublin, Mr. J. H. Sanderson of Edinburgh, and others. The loan of wood-blocks must be acknowledged separately. For a number of these the Author is indebted to the Society of Antiquaries, to the Royal Archaeological Institute, and (more than all) to Mr. G. R. French, of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Society and of the Ironmongers’ Company ; for two blocks to the kindness of Mrs. J. C. Dent, and for single engravings to his Grace the Duke of Beaufort, Mr. W. A. Tyssen- Amherst, and Mr. James Parker. Much depends upon the accuracy of the tables of date-letters, Many of them have been engraved afresh upon wood for this volume, and the London tables owe much to the personal interest taken by Mr. J. M. Garrard in superintending their execution. In conclusion the writer would only add that he will be most thankful for any notes, or impressions from the marks upon ancient plate, with which those who make use of this handbook may be good enough to favour him, in order that greater accuracy may be ensured in any future edition. Cirencester, February , 1878. W. J. c. CONTENTS CHAPTER I. PAGE Preliminary— Gold — Silver — Their alloys— The English standards — The assay — Coloured gold — Frosted silver — A simple test for silver — Goldsmiths’ weights — Mint prices for gold 1 CHAPTER II. The medireval guilds of goldsmiths in France and England — The Goldsmiths’ Com- pany of London — Regulations of the Goldsmiths’ Guild at Montpellier — Charters of the London goldsmiths — Early legislation relating to them and their marks — The Coronation Regalia — The banker-goldsmiths — Legislation from the time of Charles II. — Table of London marks 17 CHAPTER III. The marks on plate assayed in London — The leopard’s head — The maker’s mark — The date-letter — The lion passant — The lion’s head erased and figure of Britannia — The Sovereign’s head . 44 CHAPTER IV. The Provincial assay-towns and their marks, prior to 1701 — York — Newcastle- upon-Tyne— Norwich — Chester — Exeter — Hull — Gateshead — Leeds — Carlisle — Lincoln — Taunton — King’s Lynn — Sandwich — Doubtful marks — Table of old provincial marks . 66 CHAPTER V. The Provincial assay- towns and their marks, since 1701 — York — Exeter — Chester — Norwich — Newcastle-upon-Tyne — Birmingham and Sheffield — Table of modem provincial marks 99 CHAPTER VI. Scotland — Scotch legislation — The Edinburgh goldsmiths — Their marks, deacons, and assay-masters — Old provincial marks — Modern Glasgow — Table of Edinburgh and Glasgow marks 116 Xll Contents . CHAPTER VII. PAGE Ireland — The Goldsmiths’ Company of Dublin — Cork — New Geneva — Table of Dublin marks 131 CHAPTER VIII. Frauds and offences — Old offences — The report to Parliament of 1773 — The Acts of 1739 and 1844 — Cases prosecuted under their provisions — An amateur’s experiences in the streets of London — Modern frauds 139 CHAPTER IX. Ecclesiastical plate — Historical i sketch — Chalices — Communion cups — Patens — Flagons — Alms-basins — Candlesticks 150 CHAPTER X. Decorative and domestic plate — Effect of the Wars of the Roses —Prosperity of the sixteenth century — Great destruction of old plate at various times — Gold plate — Obsolete vessels — Spoons — Mazers — Salts— Stoneware jugs — Ewers, basins, and salvers — Standing cups and hanaps — Tankards — Drinking cups of various kinds — Plates — Forks — Monteitlis — Candlesticks, sconces, etc.— Toilet services and boudoir furniture — Casters and cruet-stands — Tea and coffee services, kettles, etc. — Cake-baskets and epergnes — Maces and oars— Racing-bells, etc. — Conclusion 185 APPENDIX A. Chronological List of the Examples used as Authority for London Date-letters and Makers’ Marks 305 Addenda to Appendix A xvi APPENDIX B. Improved Tables of the Date-letters used by all the English, Scotch, and Irish Assay-Offices from the earliest times . 353 INDEX . . 381 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE 1. COFFIN CHALICE AND PATEN, 13TH CENTURY 161 2. CHALICE, 13TH CENTURY, AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM 162 3. CHALICE (1479) AT NETTLECOMBE, SOM 163 4. PATEN TO THE SAME 164 5. BISHOP FOX’S CHALICE (1507) AT CORPUS CHRISTI COLL., OXFORD . . 165 6. CHALICE (1521) AT JURBY, ISLE OF MAN 166 7. CHALICE (1525) AT WYLYE, WILTS 167 8. PATEN (1527) AT TRINITY COLLEGE, OXFORD ..... 169 9. COMMUNION CUP (1570) AT CIRENCESTER . . 170 10. COMMUNION CUP AND PATEN-COVER (1576) AT CHRISTCHURCH, MONMOUTH 171 11. COMMUNION CUP (1566), NORWICH PATTERN 173 12. COMMUNION VESSELS, CIRCA 1640 175 13. COMMUNION CUP (1676) AT ASHBY-DE-LA-ZOUCHE 176 14. CUP (1535) AT CIRENCESTER 177 15. CUP (C. 1540) AT GATCOMBE, ISLE OF WIGHT 178 16. PATEN (1673) AT ST. CUTHBERT’S, YORK 179 17. COMMUNION FLAGON (1576) AT CIRENCESTER 181 18. SIDEBOARD OF THE 16TH CENTURY 190 19. MAIDENHEAD SPOON, 1540 193 20. SET OF THIRTEEN APOSTLES’ SPOONS (1626) 194 21. THREE APOSTLES’ SPOONS, 16TH CENTURY 197 22. DOMESTIC SPOONS OF THE 16TH, 17TH, AND 18TH CENTURIES . . . 199 23. TEA-SPOONS, C. 1750’ 200 24. MAZER, TEMP. RICHARD II 206 25. THE SCROPE MAZER, YORK MINSTER 208 26. MAZER (C. 1450) AT IRONMONGERS’ HALL, LONDON 210 27. MAZER (C. 1470) AT ORIEL COLL.. OXFORD 210 28. BAND OF NARFORD MAZER (1532) 211 29. MAZER (C. 1535), THE PROPERTY OF A. W. FRANKS, ESQ 212 30. STANDING MAZER (1529) AT ALL SOULS’ COLL., OXFORD . . . . 212 31. CUP, WITH RODNEY ARMS ... ...... 213 XIV List of Illustrations. PAGE 32. CUP, FROM THE HAMILTON PALACE COLLECTION 214 33. CUP (1492), FROM THE SOLTYKOFF COLLECTION 215 34. CUP, THE PROPERTY OF OCTAVIUS MORGAN, ESQ 215 35. THE “WALTER HILL” SALT (1493) AT NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD . . 219 36. HOUR-GLASS SALT (1518) AT IRONMONGERS’ HALL, LONDON . . . 220 37. STANDING SALT (1567), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF NORWICH 221 38. STANDING SALT (1569) AT VINTNERS’ HALL, LONDON .... 222 39. THE “ HAMMERSLEY ” SALT (1595) AT HABERDASHERS’ HALL, LONDON . 223 40. BELL SALT (1607) AT CHRIST’S HOSPITAL, LONDON ..... 224 41. THE “ WALDO ” SALT (1661) AT CLOTHWORKERS’ HALL, LONDON . . 225 42. OCTAGONAL SALT (1685) AT MERCERS’ HALL, LONDON 225 43. THE “ EDDYSTONE LIGHTHOUSE ” SALT (1698) 226 44. TRENCHER SALTS 227 45. STONEWARE JUG (1562) AT VINTNERS’ HALL, LONDON .... 228 46. THE ABP. PARKER EWER (1545) AT CORPUS CHRISTI COLL., CAMBRIDGE . 230 47. SALVER TO THE SAME 231 48. EWER (1617), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF NORWICH . . 232 49. SALVER TO THE SAME 233 50. ROSE-WATER SALVER (1617) AT MERCHANT TAYLORS’ HALL, LONDON . 234 51. - EWER (1741) AT GOLDSMITHS’ HALL, LONDON 235 52. COCOA-NUT CUP (C. 1500) AT IRONMONGERS’ HALL, LONDON . . . 241 53. OSTRICH-EGG CUP (1610) AT EXETER COLLEGE, OXFORD .... 242 54. OSTRICH-EGG CUP (1623), THE PROPERTY OF H. WILLETT, ESQ. . . . 243 55. WASSAIL HORN (14TH CENTURY) AT QUEEN’S COLLEGE, OXFORD . . 244 56. DRINKING HORN AT CHRIST’S HOSPITAL, LONDON 245 57. THE CAWDOR HORN, TEMP. HENRY VII 246 58. THE FOUNDRESS’ CUP (C. 1440) AT CHRIST’S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE . . 247 59. BEAKER (C. 1460) AT ORIEL COLLEGE, OXFORD 248 60. THE FOUNDRESS’ BEAKER (1507) AT CHRIST’S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE . . 249 61. THE LEIGH C(JP (1499) AT MERCERS’ HALL, LONDON .... 250 62. THE RICHMOND CUP AT ARMOURERS’ HALL, LONDON 251 63. THE ABP. PARKER CUP (1569) AT CORPUS CHRISTI COLL., CAMBRIDGE . 252 64. THE CHAPMAN CUP (1580) AT ARMOURERS’ HALL, LONDON . . . 253 65. THE PEA-HEN CUP (1643) AT SKINNERS’ HALL, LONDON . . . . 254 66. THE MILK-MAID WAGER CUP AT VINTNEKS’ HALL, LONDON . . .255 67. THE EDMONDS’ CUP (1613) AT ARMOURERS’ HALL, LONDON. . . . 256 68. the blacksmiths’ cup (1655) 257 69. THE ROYAL OAK CUP (1676) AT BARBER-SURGEONS’ HALL, LONDON . . 259 70. THE PEPYS CUP (1677) AT CLOTHWORKERS’ HALL, LONDON . . . 260 71. CUP (1739), BY PAUL LAMERIE, AT GOLDSMITHS’ HALL, LONDON . . 261 List of Illustrations . xv PAGE 72. CUP (1795) AT MERCHANT TAYLORS’ HALL, LONDON .... 262 73. TANKARD (1574) AT THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM, OXFORD . . . . 264 74. THE “POISON” TANKARD (C. 1565) AT CLARE COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE . 265 75. TANKARD (1618), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF NORWICH . 266 76. TANKARD (1634), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF BRISTOL . 267 77. IRISH TANKARDS (1680) AT MERCHANT TAYLORS’ HALL, LONDON J . 268 78. TAZZA (1633), THE PROPERTY OF OCTAVIUS MORGAN, ESQ. . . . 270 79. BEAKER (1604) AT MERCERS’ HALL, LONDON 271 80. CAUDLE-CUP (1654) AT CLOTHWORKERS’ HALL, LONDON . . . .272 81. CAUDLE-CUP (1670) 273 82. PORRINGER (1674) 274 83. FLUTED PORRINGER (1699) 275 84. MONTEITH (1702) AT VINTNERS’ HALL, LONDON 282 85. CANDLESTICK (C. 1670) AT PENIARTH 283 86. CANDLESTICK (1735) 284 87. CANDLESTICK (1773) AT NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD 285 88. toilet-box (1682) 286 89. FIRE-DOG (C. 1685) AT KNOLE 287 90. JAR (C. 1685) AT KNOLE 288 91. WINE-CISTERN (1734) AT THE WINTER PALACE, ST. PETERSBURG . . 290 92. COFFEE-POT (1765) AT SALTERS’ HALL, LONDON 292 93. TEA-URN (1771) AT BARBER-SURGEONS* HALL, LONDON . . . . 293 94. CHOCOLATE POT (1777) AT SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM . . . 294 95. CAKE-BASKET (1731), BY PAUL LAMERIE 295 96. ANOTHER (1749), DITTO 296 97. MACES AT WINCHCOMBE, 16TH CENTURY 297 98. MACE (1604) AT MORPETH 298 99. MACE (1625) OF THE WARD OF CHEAP 299 100. MACE OF THE TOWER WARD, TEMP. CHARLES II 299 101. OAR-MACE (C. 1690) OF CINQUE PORTS ADMIRALTY COURT . . . . 300 102. OAR OF DOVER WATER-BAILIFF 301 103. RACING-BELLS, TEMP. ELIZ., AT CARLISLE 302 104. COCKING-BELL (1655) 302 ADDENDA TO APPENDIX A.. Page 305. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1656 16791 1690 1699 1714j 1721 j Do. I 1727 1735 1736 1740 1753 1762 1776 1778 [E>g [ckJ LE [w-rl John Leach, ent. 1697 Joseph Clare, ent. 1713. Simon Pantin, ent. 1720. Edw. Turner 1720. ES AB LD ent, | Timothy Ley, ent before 1697. i P. Pilleau Henry Herbert, ent. 1737. T. Whipham and W. Williams, ent. 1740 Peter Archambo and P. Meure, ent. 1749 Magdalen Feline, ent. 1753. Walter Tweedie, ent. 1775. Abraham Barrier and Louis Ducommon. Tankard, given 1656. Innholders’ Company. Tankard. Eton College. Flat-handled spoon, found under floor of hall. Oriel Coll., Oxford. Mace. Corporation of Deal, Kent. Beaker. Ptev. T. Staniforth. Two-handled cup. Painter- Stainers’ Company. Candlesticks with baluster stems. Bev. T. Staniforth. Paten. Newchurch, Kent. T. Ley made much Kent church plate. Soap-box. Viscount Midleton. Paten plate. Kensington Palace Chapel. Chocolate-pot. Earl Amherst. Pierced and chased (corn ears, &e.) cake basket. Noted by Author. Shallow bowls or trays with lobed edges. Noted by the Author. Two-handled preserving pan. Pit. Hon. Sir M. E. Hicks-Beach, Bart. Table spoons. W. Deedes, Esq. OLD ENGLISH PLATE. CHAPTER I. PRELIMINARY — GOLD — SILVER — THEIR ALLOYS — THE ENGLISH STANDARDS — THE ASSAY — COLOURED GOLD— FROSTED SILVER — A SIMPLE TEST FOR SILVER— GOLDSMITHS’ WEIGHTS— MINT PRICES FOR GOLD. Gold and silver, the best known of the noble metals, seem marked out by their natural beauty, their cost, and by the facility with which they lend themselves to the designs of the artist and the craftsman, as the appropriate materials for all the articles, whether of utility or ornament, that are specially devoted to the service of magnificence and splendour. From the earliest times devotion and luxury have habitually taken expression in their use. The beauty and rarity of these metals having thus early attracted attention, it is not wonderful that the properties which render them so available to the workman should have long been understood and appreciated. Their malleability, ductility, and the brilliant polish of which they are susceptible, have been known from time immemorial, and valued by every nation that has left any distinct mark upon the pages of history. The Egyptians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, Greeks, and Komans, were all well acquainted with both gold and silver, and high authority places the vessels recently found on the supposed site of Troy and at Mycense amongst genuine relics of pre-Hellenic or, more indefinitely still, Homeric times. The early historical books of the Bible show that even a nomad tribe in their desert wanderings were able to carry the art of the goldsmith to a high state of perfection fifteen centuries before the commencement of the Christian era. The malleability of gold must have been well understood by him who “ did beat gold into thin plates ” (Exod. xxxix. 3), and could “ cut it into wires to work it into fine linen with cunning work.” Adorning it with jewels must have been a familiar art to those who “ wrought onyx stones enclosed in 2 Old English Plate. [CHAP. I. ouches of gold ” (Exod. xxxix. 6) ; and wliat more like work of some modern artist than the candlestick wrought by the Israelitish smith of old, with its six branches of beaten work, “ his shaft and his branch, his bowls, his knops, and his flowers of the same ; three bowls made after the fashion of almonds in one branch, a knop and a flower ; and three bowls made like almonds in another branch, a knop and a flower : so throughout the six branches going out of the candle- stick” (Exod. xxxvii.). It is unnecessary to multiply these early Biblical evidences — gold and silver are mentioned on every page ; the fining pot for silver, the furnace for gold, and the refiner’s fire are used as familiar images ; suffice it to say, that from the time of Joseph’s cup of silver and Solomon’s drinking vessels of gold, all the more costly articles of household decoration and use have been made of those precious metals, and that from the time of the ark and the tabernacle, devotion has lavished them upon the adornment of its shrines and the fabrica- tion of utensils dedicated to the service of religion. Turn we to Homer and we find the same ; the Kparpp, wine bowl of silver, sometimes with brim of gold, sometimes all gilt, stands in the entrance hall on a tripod ; silver wine cups are given as rewards ; gold thread, gold plate, refined gold, gold vessels of every kind con- stantly mentioned ; Greek words compounded of XP V(T °$ (gold) and apyvpos (silver) are to be counted by hundreds. Roman homes gleamed with silver in the days of Horace — riclet argento domus (Hor. Od. iv. 11. 6). Cicero speaks of a shipload of wrought and stamped silver; Pliny of suppers served on pure and antique silver (Plin. Ep. iii. 1. 9) ; Yirgil of libations poured out of golden bowls — pateris libamus etciuro (Georg, ii. 192). Silver and gold have ever since been prized in the same way, and modern nations vie with the ancients and one another in the taste and art with which they apply them, and add to their beauty and value, whether by the aid of jewels or enamels, chasing, engraving, or the exquisite work that may be produced by even the hammer alone, wielded by skilful hands. Before proceeding to consider the gold and silver plate of our own country, and the makers’ and other marks from which, as we shall find, it is often possible for the expert to gather much curious information, it will be well to note what may seem to be of use to the amateur and collector of old plate, as to the precious metals them- selves and their alloys, and as to the modes adopted from time to time of ascertaining the proportion of pure gold and silver contained in given portions of such alloys, or articles made of them, not forgetting CHAP. I.] Gold. 'y O some remarks upon the England standards, and the weights used by the English goldsmiths. And first as to gold. GOLD. This is one of the most widely distributed of all metals, being found alike in volcanic rocks and alluvial deposits, sometimes in small masses or nuggets, but more often in a granular form. It is found both in the Old and New Worlds ; Hungary, Brazil, the Ural Mountains, Mexico, and Peru, have all furnished large quantities, hut none of them anything like the amount supplied by California and Australia in modern times. According to Cernuschi, whilst its production annually up to 1850 was hut equal to £6,000,000, it was not less than £36,000,000 in 1852, and since 1872 has averaged about £19,000,000. The British Isles have contributed their share, gold having been found in Cornwall, Wales, Scotland, and in the Wicklow Mountains in Ireland ; we find the Crawford Moor district (Wanlockhead, etc., in Lanarkshire), once yielding no less than £100,000 of gold in three years’ washing ; and Mr. Patrick Dudgeon of Cargen notices a mention of gold in Scotland, in a grant by King David I., a.d. 1125, to the Church of the Holy Trinity at Dunfermline, of his tenth of all the gold found in Fife and some other places. In Wanlockhead nuggets of gold have been found, and gold in grains may even now be obtained by washing. A piece of quartz having veins of gold in it was found there in 1872, and is described by Mr. Dudgeon. An analysis of this gold, made by Professor A. H. Church, gave him the following result, viz. — Gold 86-60 Silver 12-39 Iron '35 Other substances and loss '66 sp. gr. 16'50 A sample of Sutherlandshire gold has given the same analyst a smaller proportion of pure gold, viz. : Gold.. Silver 79*22^ 20'78 / sp. gr. 16'62 To these may he added analyses on the same high authority as the preceding, from each of the other districts mentioned above, and also one of gold from Ashanti by way of comparison. Wicklow... Gold 92-32 Silver 6*17 Wales Gold 90*16 Silver 9'26 Cornwall.. .Gold 90-12 Silver 9-05 Ashanti ...Gold 90-Q5 Silver 9-94 4 Old English Plate. [chap. I. It will be observed that in the specimen from Ashanti there was found but part of anything but gold and its invariable com- panion, silver. It remains to notice the physical properties of gold, which are the same wherever it is found, — its great density and weight, its malleability, ductility, its beautiful yellow colour, and the brilliant polish of which it is susceptible. Even in its least dense state, as cast gold, its specific gravity is 19*25, that is to say, it is 19J times heavier than water, whilst, by hammering or rolling, its specific gravity can be made up to 19*80 or even 19*40. Its weight is correspondingly great : a cubic inch weighs 10*16 oz. Troy, and a cube measuring six inches every way will therefore weigh no less than 182*88 lb. Troy, or about as much as a man can lift. Gold is so malleable that it can be beaten into leaves the go^ooo part of an inch thick, and so ductile that a grain can be drawn into more than 500 feet of wire ; it is these properties that are of such importance to the worker in gold. SILVER. This metal is also very widely distributed : the chief sources of supply in former days were Hungary, Transylvania, and Spain, but since the discovery of America an enormous quantity has come from thence, and especially from Peru and Mexico ; it also exists in large quantities in sea water. It is, however, very seldom found pure, being usually in combination with other substances, often with lead, and it is by separating silver from lead that a great deal of British silver is produced at the present time. A mention of this process is noticed by Mr. Dudgeon in an Act of Parliament of James I. of Scotland, passed in 1424. It has been estimated that up to 1880 silver was produced in three- fold quantities compared with gold ; the annual production for the ten years ending 1871 being about 5010,000,000. In 1872 and up to 1875 valued at the same rate in relation to gold, it would be 5018,700,000; and if we assume that the ratio of 1 : 15| represents the proportion between the value of silver and that of gold, then the annual production of both metals for twenty-four years represents £'38,000,000. A specimen of native Cornish silver (Wheal Ludcott) has given Professor A. H. Church — Silver 97*86 * Silver Chloride *71 Gold and antimony *21 sp. gr. 10*26. Iron '15 Loss, &c I ’07; CHAP. I.] Silver. 5 Silver is not so malleable as gold, although it may be beaten into leaves no more than the part of an inch thick, and it may be drawn into a wire finer by far than human hair, such is its ductility. Its specific gravity differs greatly from that of gold, being from 10*40 to 10*60 according to circumstances, and the weight of a cubic inch is 5*52 oz. Troy, or not much more than half the weight of a similar cube of gold. ALLOYS. We have now noted what is necessary as to pure gold and pure silver, and the importance of some of the details recorded, especially those relating to their specific gravities, will presently be seen. But both these metals when in a state of purity are too soft for the purposes of either coin or plate. It was therefore found expedient in the earliest times to employ some other metal as an alloy to give them the required degree of hardness without materially affecting their colour. It may be remarked in passing that the word alloy is often said to be derived from the French a la loi, the proportion of baser metal that might be used for this purpose having been from very early days regulated by law ; but it must also be said that the word seems more often than not used for the mixed metal itself rather than for the portion of baser metal added to the purer gold or silver, and coupling this with the fact that the French express it b yalliage, there is reason to think that the word may not impossibly be derived from oilier rather than a la loi. In mint language the alloy is the base metal added to the more precious one, following the language of successive ordinances down even to the Coinage Act of 1870.* It will be found used in both senses in these pages. However this may be, the necessity of alloying pure gold and silver is certain, and it is found that whilst silver or copper are the metals which can be most usefully employed in forming such an alloy with gold, copper only can be advantageously used for the alloy with silver. The admixture of silver with gold renders the alloy paler and yellower than pure gold, whilst copper makes it more red : and in the case of silver it is found that the other white metals render it too brittle and not easily workable. The maximum hardness of an alloy of silver is obtained when the copper amounts to one-fifth of the silver, * See Prof. W. Chaudler-Roberts’ Cantor Lectures on Alloys used for Coinage. Pro- ceedings of the Society of Arts, 1884. 6 Old English Plate. [CHAP. I. but the colour is scarcely impaired when the alloy consists of equal parts of the two metals, hence a means of committing great frauds. The proportions found by experience to produce the best results are, for gold twenty-two parts (in technical terms called carats) of fine or pure gold, and two parts of alloy ; and for silver 11 oz. 2 dwts. of fine silver and 18 dwts. of copper in the Troy pound of 12 oz., or in other words, 222 parts of fine silver to 18 such parts of copper. If the quality of silver is given in thousandth parts, as is often the case, our standard silver, which contains in every 1000 parts 925 of fine silver, would be reported as 925* fine, and the higher or Britannia standard, which will be presently mentioned, as 959* fine. Standard gold, expressed in the same way, is of millesimal fineness 916 '66 ; whilst 18-carat gold would be represented by 750'. It must be added with regard to the estimation of the fineness of gold in carats, that originally the Troy ounce was divided into twenty-four carats, and each carat into four grains, but the carat is now only understood to be the T V part of the metal, and gold of twenty-two carats means a mixture of twenty- two parts of fine gold with two parts of alloy, gold of eighteen carat a mixture of eighteen parts of pure gold with six parts of alloy, and so on. Some interesting facts about these alloys are to be found in the Report for 1873 of Mr. W. Chandler-Roberts, F.R.S., the chemist to the Mint. He states that the alloying metal now employed for the English coinage, both gold and silver, is copper only, and that the gold-copper alloys, of one of which “ standard” gold is formed, are practically homogeneous — that is to say, every part of the mixture is of the same quality. They are considered by Matthiessen to be “ solidified solutions of allotropic modifications of the metals in each other.” The result in the case of standard silver alloy is not so satis- factory. This appears to be a “solidified mechanical mixture of two solutions, and the cooling of such an alloy is accompanied with a remarkable molecular re-arrangement, in virtue of which certain com- binations of the constituents of the molten alloy become segregated from the mass, and its homogeneous character is destroyed.” Por- tions taken from different parts of a trial plate of such metal would hot necessarily all be of exactly the same degree of fineness, though the whole plate as a mass might be of exactly the correct standard. Levol is said by Mr. Chandler-Roberts in this Report to have proved, as the result of a series of experiments conducted in the Mint at Paris, that it is only the alloy containing 71*898 per centum of silver which is absolutely homogeneous, and that while in alloys containing more CHAP. I.] 7 The English Standards. silver than this amount, the centre of the solidified mass is richer than the exterior, in alloys of lower fineness than 71*893 per centum, the centre contains less silver than the external portions. Mr. Chandler-Roberts’ own experiments upon standard silver confirm Levol’s statement as to the concentration of silver towards the centre of the mass ; but they also prove that the molecular re-arrangement is comparatively slight if the mass is slowly and uniformly solidified. THE ENGLISH STANDARDS. The proportions which have been mentioned above, viz., for gold 22 parts or carats of fine gold and 2 parts of alloy, and for silver 11 oz. 2 dwfcs. of fine silver, and 18 dwts. of copper, are those which form our “standard” or “sterling” alloys in England, and with small exception this has been so in the case of gold since the Restoration in 1660, and in the case of silver from far earlier times. They are signified whenever the expressions “standard gold” and “sterling silver ” are used, and they are the standards of the present gold and silver coin of the realm. The word “ sterling ” is derived, be it said with some doubt, from the name by which the inhabitants of Eastern Germany, who were called Easterlings in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, were known. The purity of their money was famous, and it is said that coiners were fetched from thence to improve the quality of our own currency. In connection with this it may be noted, that a statute of 1343 (17 Edw. III.), providing that good “ sterling ” money should be made in England, also provides that good Flemish money shall pass current, but voluntarily, that is to say, its circulation was permitted, without making its acceptance compulsory, nor the offer of it a legal tender. In many other countries besides our own, legislation on this subject has been found necessary or advisable, but as far as English plate is concerned, it is enough to detail the English standards, and even as regards these it will be convenient to reserve for the next chapter such more minute changes as are found to occur now and then in the course of the legal history of the goldsmith’s craft. For the sake of clearness the following Table is appended, which will give at a glance a comparative view of the fineness of English gold and silver money, and gold and silver plate from time to time. 8 Old English Plate. [CHAP. I. Comparative Table of the Standard Fineness of Gold Money and Gold Plate. Gold Money. Cai-ats line. Gold Plate. Carats fine. 41 Henry III, . 18Edw. III. .] to 12 Chas. II. . i 12 Charles II. . 24 carats (pure gold). | Varied from 23 3^ carats to 22 carats, but never lower than the latter, except from 37 Hen.; VIII. to 3 Edw. VI., when it was 20 carats. 22 carats, at which it has remained ever since. 28 Edward I. 17 Edward IV. . I 18 Elizabeth 38 George III. . 17 & 18 Viet. . (“ Touch of Paris”) 19± carats. 18 carats. 22 carats. 22 carats and 18 carats. 3 lower standards of 15, 12, and 9 carats respectively added. Comparative Table of the Standard Fineness of Silver Money and Silver Plate. Silver Money. Fine. Alloy. Silver Plate. Fine. Alloy. 28 Edward I. . oz. dwts. oz. dwts. 11 2 — 0 18 j 28 Edward I. oz. dwts. oz. dwts. “As good as sterling.” 34 Henry VIII. 36 ditto 37 ditto (being sterling silver.) 10 0 — 2 0 6 0 — 6 0 4 0 — 8 0 : 8 & 9 Will. III. 6 George I. . . 11 10 — 0 10 (New sterling, or “ Bri- tannia ” standard.) 11 2 — 0 18 2 Edward VI. . 4 ditto 6 ditto 1 Mary . . . 2 Elizabeth . . 6 0 — 6 0 3 0 — 9 0 11 1 — 0 19 11 0 — 1 0 11 2 — 0 18 Being sterling standard restored, at which it has remained ever since. 1 Being the old sterling standard restored ; this and the above new sterling have both been legal stan- dards from 1720 to the present day. It must be understood that the standard of fineness remained the same from any one date in the above table, until the next entry occurs. Formerly, the standard gold of the English coinage was alloyed with silver as well as copper, and it was consequently of the paler yellow or greenish colour we notice in the case of old sovereigns, and Australian sovereigns up to recent years. This older mixture con- tained according to the standard trial plates of 1728 and 1829 respectively, the following proportions of gold and alloying metals : — - 1728 1829 Gold .... 916*1 .......... 915-3 Silver .... 50*4 37-6 Copper . . . ... 33*5 Since 1829 or thereabouts, copper only has been used as an alloy, and the specific gravity has been reduced from about 17*82 to 17*57 ; 9 chap, i.] The English Standards. whilst quite recently even the traces of silver existing in the natural gold have been removed. This is effected by passing a stream of chlorine gas through the molten gold, by a process invented by Mr. F. B. Miller, which purifies it not only from the silver, but from other metals, some of them injurious to the gold if required for coining purposes. This process has been of late years extensively employed for recovering silver from gold, and for toughening the latter metal. The trial plate of 1873 shows gold 916*61 and copper 83*39. The specific gravity of our English standard or sterling silver is 10'30. The last three Mint trial plates for silver show respectively : — 1728 1829 1873 Silver 928*9 925*0 924*96 Copper... 71*1 75*0 75*04 The remedy or permitted variation from standard has varied from time to time in the case of gold as well as silver. The earliest known remedy for the gold coin, then of 23*3^ carats fine, was Jth a carat, or 5*2 thousandths. This was allowed by Edward III. in 1345. The most ancient trial plate now preserved is for this standard, and is of the year 1477. It shows Gold 993*15 Silver 5*15 Copper, etc. ... 1*35 This, or sometimes -^th of a carat or 6*9 thousandths, remained the rule till 1649, since which time till 1817 ^th of a carat has continually been the remedy for the 22 -carat coinage gold. In this last year an effort was made to attain greater accuracy in the coinage, and the remedy was reduced from Jth to T 'gtli of a carat, or 2*6 thousandths. It is now 2*0 thousandths. The silver remedy was 2dwts. or 8*4 thousandths from 1601 to 1817, when 1 dwt. or 4*2 thousandths was substituted. At the present time it is 4*0 thousandths. THE ASSAY. Proceeding to consider the modes by which the fineness of the precious metals and their alloys may be tested, we must not forget the old story of Hiero’s golden crown, and how it was referred to Archi- medes to ascertain whether the suspicions of the king that it was alloyed with silver, were well founded. The picturesque account of his bath overflowing on his entering it, thereby suggesting to his philosophic mind a mode of solving the difficult problem, and of his flight home, forgetting even his garments in his haste, that he might IO Old English Plate . [CHAP. I. set about it at once, may be true ; but certain it is that, well skilled in mechanics and hydrostatics, he used the means with which he was most familiar, and detected the fraud by the aid of what we should call the specific gravity of the metal, instead of by a chemical analysis, at that time not understood. It will be obvious that a test depending entirely upon the weight and bulk of the object to be examined, as compared with water, can only be usefully applied to a mass of some metal, or of mixed metals, of the same density throughout and free from any hollows, for the occurrence of any foreign substance of a different specific gravity, or of hollow places in the middle of a mass, would render its application useless. It is, however, not without its value, and especially in the case of gold, owing to the very marked difference between the weight of equal bulks of gold and of silver or copper, or a mixture of the two. A short table which has been compiled from figures given by a well- known professional assayer,* will show this very clearly : — 1 cubic inch of pure gold sp. gr. 19 - 25 = 1016 oz. Troy. 1 ,, pure silver „ 10'47 — 5’52 oz. ,, 1 copper ., 8’72 — 4-60 oz. „ 1 .. 11 parts of silver and 7 of copper = 5-16 oz. (The usual alloy for gold.) 1 .. equal parts of silver and copper ss 5*06 oz. „ The writer now quoted draws attention to the fact that a quantity of the last alloy mentioned in this list is almost exactly half the weight of an equal bulk of pure gold. There are two cases in which these facts can be made of use ; if the quality of the metal be known, it can be ascertained whether an article made of it is solid throughout, or hollow ; and again, if it be known to be solid throughout, as for instance in the case of a beaten plate of metal, its specific gravity will readily show whether it is formed of pure gold, or of gold mixed with alloy. Archimedes must have satisfied himself that Hiero’s crown was solid throughout, before he could have founded a decision that it was alloyed with silver on the fact that when immersed in a vessel con- taining water it displaced a certain greater quantity of water than was displaced when the same weight of pure gold was put into the vessel. It will of course be a good test for articles suspected to be plated. But as these early times do not immediately concern the present inquiry, we must pass to the mode used in what are called the Middle Ages, and even in more modern times, of testing the fineness of gold and silver by the touchstone, or pierre de touclie . King Henry VII. * The Book of Hall Marks , by A. Lutschaunig, London, 1872. chap, i.] The Assay. 1 1 by his will directs tliat “ there be made a tomb of stone called Touche sufficiently large both for our dearest late wife the Queen and ourself.” This Touchstone or Basanite is an imperfect black jasper or black flinty slate, originally brought from Mount Tmolus in Lydia, and therefore called lapis Li/dius ; it is, however, found in various parts of the world, and indeed any hard black siliceous substance, or even a piece of black pottery, will serve the purpose. The great Josiah Wedgwood made such, stamped with w ^i1ujria D about 1770 or 1780. This mode of trying the fineness was called “ touching,” and the word obtained for a long time after the adoption of the chemical assay. The word “ touch ” seems to have been applied indifferently to the trial, to the quality of the metal tested, and to the mark impressed upon it. For the trial of gold, sets of touch-needles or bars were used, one set alloyed with copper, another with silver, and in some c^ses a third set alloyed with silver and copper mixed, twenty-four in each set, according to the twenty-four carats’ fineness of gold. The streak or touch made on the touchstone with the piece under examination was compared with the streaks made by the needles, these streaks were also washed with aquafortis, which dissolving the alloying metals, left the gold pure, and by the comparison its fineness was determined. For testing silver, sets of needles were also used. In Germany the set consisted of sixteen, after the sixteen loth * according to which the standard of fineness was there computed, but doubtless the number varied in different countries according to the computation of the standard. In skilful hands much information could be derived from the sensations of greasiness or dryness, roughness or smoothness, imparted by the stroke ; but this test has been little used for many centuries, and it could never have been a satisfactory mode of ascer- taining the purity of silver, into which so much copper could be introduced without materially affecting its colour, though it is probable that the hardness of the alloy aided in the detection of fraud. The “ touch,” however, long continued the mode of trying gold, and indeed is even used at the present day for rough examinations. The period at which the chemical assay or assay by the cupel was first introduced is not exactly known, but it was certainly practised in the thirteenth century, and, as we shall see, was the mode of examina- tion adopted by the authorities in the fourteenth century. In the latter it was practised at Montpellier in France, a city famous for its goldsmiths. * The Cologne pound was divided into 2 marks, and each mark into 16 loth. The mark — 3608 gr. English, 1 2 Old English Plate. [chap. i. In the following chapter we shall come to definite mention of the “ assay ” in 1800, which is early enough for our purpose. The process of the assay in contradistinction to the touch is as follows : — for gold, to a portion of metal scraped off the article to he examined, say about eight grains, after being accurately weighed, is added three times its weight of silver, and a proper proportion of lead, the latter by wrapping the gold and silver in a piece of sheet lead. The whole is placed in a small shallow porous crucible made of hone ashes, called a cupel, and exposed to a bright-red heat ; the metals melt, and whilst the silver and gold combine, the lead and alloying metals become oxydised, and the oxides are absorbed by the cupel, leaving a button of pure gold and silver. This button is then flattened, rolled out into a strip, which is then coiled into a sort of screw, called a “ cornet ; ” this is placed in hot diluted nitric acid, by which the silver is dissolved and the gold alone remains, the cornet is then treated with stronger nitric acid, washed, and lastly made red-hot : when cold it is weighed again, and the difference between its present weight and the original weight of the scrapings carefully determined. For silver the process is much the same : a certain portion, usually about ten or twenty grains, is scraped off the article, some being taken from each separate part : this is wrapped in lead of proportionate weight, and the whole heated in the cupel. The result is the same as in the case of gold, except that the button remaining is of pure silver only ; the difference between the weight of this button and the original weight of the portion operated upon, shows the amount of alloy. The portion of metal taken off for examination is called the “ diet.” Of this process a minutely-detailed account is given in a small book published in 1675, called A Touchstone for Gold and Silver Wares, and the process is now carried on at Goldsmiths’ Hall in precisely the same manner as then, even to the mode of folding up the papers to contain the scrapings of the metal to be assayed. If the article examined is found to be of the required fineness, the marks are stamped on it with punches ; but if the metal is not of the proper quality, the article is crushed, and so delivered back to the maker. It is scarcely credible that every separate part of every separate article made of gold or silver (with the few exceptions that will appear later) in this country, goes through this process of examination, either in London or in one of the provincial assay-towns, but such is the fact ; and the public are greatly indebted to the companies of goldsmiths, and especially to the great London guild, for the effectual protection afforded by their vigilance against the frauds which prevailed in earlier times. There is yet another mode of testing silver, an account of which has CHAP. I.] The Assay . 13 been partly taken from Brande and Cox’s Dictionary of Science , Literature , and Art, together with some of the notes which follow it. This mode, the assay of silver in the humid way, may be adopted where the quality of the alloy is approximately known. The process depends upon the precipitation of the silver by a standard solution of common salt, each 1000 grains of which contain a sufficient quantity of salt to precipitate ten grains of silver, so that supposing the silver and the salt to be pure, ten grains of silver dissolved in nitric acid would be entirely precipitated by 1000 grains of the standard solution. The process is as simple as that of assaying by the cupel. The metal scrapings after being weighed are put into a small bottle and dissolved in nitric acid, to this solution is then added the standard solution of salt, as long as it produces cloudiness; at the moment when no further change occurs, the number of measures of salt solution used is read off, and the fineness of the alloy determined with great accuracy by the amount of the standard solution of salt which has been required to precipitate completely the silver from its solution ; thus supposing we were operating upon fine silver, we should have used 1000 such measures, but with the same weight of sterling silver, say silver coin, 925 only would have been required. It may be that assaying by means of the spectroscope may some day supersede these older methods, but the attempts which have been made as yet in this direction have only served to prove that in the present state of science, little or no practical use can be made of this beautiful instrument for assaying purposes. Some experiments made by Mr. Chandler-Boberts at the Mint with Professor Hughes’ Induction Currents Balance seem to show that it is more probable that some day electricity may be pressed into the service of the assayer. A detailed description of this invention would be out of place here, suffice it to say, that it is capable of revealing the existence of very minute proportions of gold in silver, and of silver in gold, and thus, already useful in the examination of certain alloys of the precious metals, may eventually become of practical value in assaying them. It was thought at first that when combined with what Professor Hughes calls a sonometer , and with a telephone, the difference might be detected in the sound produced by two shillings both fresh from the Mint, one of which has been rubbed between the fingers and the other not.* This is perhaps rather more than can be said to have been really accomplished as yet, but it will doubtless be achieved at no very distant day. Enough has now been said about processes, which after all can only Nineteenth Century Review, October, 1879. H Old English Plate. [CHAP. I. be carried out by expert hands, and we may pass on to a few notes of general utility belonging to the chemical part of the subject, referring those whom the subject of practical assaying may interest to the standard works on Metallurgy, especially Dr. Percy’s volume on Silver. A word will he expected about the “ frosted ” silver, and what is called the “ coloured ” gold, that is so often seen in the windows of the goldsmiths’ shops; and first, what is “coloured gold?” It is metal from the immediate surface of which the copper or other alloy has been removed, so as to leave an outer coat of pure gold. An article treated in this way has all the appearance of being made of purer gold than it is, but the coating of fine gold is one of almost inconceivable thinness, “ not thicker,” says Mr. Lutscliaunig, “ than the hundredth part of the breadth of a hair. It is the same as if the article were gilt or electro-plated, only that in the one instance the alloy is taken out of the gold on the surface, leaving the pure gold, and that in the other the gold is put on. Any gold over nine carats can be coloured by boiling in nitric acid, or other preparation acting in the same manner.” “ Frosted ” silver is silver similarly dealt with. If silver mixed with copper, our own standard silver for example, be heated to a dull red heat in air, it becomes of a black colour from the formation of a film of oxide of copper, and if this be removed by its being dipped in hot diluted sulphuric acid, the silver becomes of the beautiful white appearance called “ frosted ” silver, owing to a film of pure silver being left on its immediate surface.* We find the celebrated London silversmith of the last century, Paul Lamerie, who died in 1751, directing in his will that all the plate in hand at the time of his death should be “ forthwith finished and made fit for sale by being boiled and burnished.” New coins owe their brilliancy to this mode of treatment before being struck, the darker appearance of their projecting parts after some wear is occasioned by the alloy showing through the pure surface. Articles of plate may also be deadened, matted, or frosted by being boiled in bi- sulphate of potash, which acts in the same way as the diluted sulphuric acid. The bad quality of the silver of which base coin or any other article of base metal is made may be detected immediately by the use of a solution of common nitrate of silver. If thirty grains of this salt be dissolved in an ounce of distilled water, and a drop or two of the solution be placed upon the suspected coin or metal, a brown or black film or spongy mass of metallic silver will appear in the case of base metal, and its quantity will form a rough measure of the degree of baseness. * In Mint language this is called “blanching,” CHAP. 7.] Goldsmiths Weights. T5 GOLDSMITHS’ WEIGHTS. In former times the Tower pound, or j oois d'orfevres , the old pound sterling of silver, was used by the goldsmiths, and in the earlier inventories, such as those of the Treasury of the Exchequer and in the Wardrobe Accounts, the weight of articles of plate is recorded in such pounds, and in marks, shillings, and pence for sub-divisions. This ancient pound was equal to 5400 grains Troy, and was divided into twenty shillings, and these last into twelve pence or pennyweights ; the mark was two-thirds of the Tower pound. These, however, ceased to be legal mint weights in the reign of Henry VIII. They had long before that fallen out of common use, but in 1526-7 (18 Henry VIII.) the Tower pound was abolished by royal proclamation. The Troy pound then substituted for the Tower pound is said to have been introduced into England as early as the great French wars of the reign of Edward III., or perhaps earlier, and its name was no doubt derived from the French town of Troyes, where a celebrated fair was held. It has been used ever since by the trade of goldsmiths for all gold and silver wares in England, but as its subdivisions are not so commonly known as the avoirdupois weights of commercial life, it will be useful to give in addition to a table of the Troy weights, a table by which the weight of plate as ascertained by the ordinary domestic avoidupois scale, may be easily and quickly converted into the Troy reckoning by which it would have to be valued or sold. TROY WEIGHTS. 24 grains = 1 dwt. (pennyweight). 480 grains = 20 dwts. = 1 oz. (ounce). 5760 grains = 240 dwts. = 12 oz. = 1 lb. (pound). AVOIRDUPOIS WEIGHTS. 4371 grains = 1 oz. 7000 grains = 16 oz. = 1 lb. The grain is the same in both cases. Comparative Table of Troy and Avoirdupois Weights. Avoirdupois. Troy. | Avoirdupois. Troy. 1 oz. = — - 4 dwts. 13f gr. 8 oz. = 7 oz. 5 dwts. 20 * i, ^ — 9 „ 2| „ 9 „ = 8 „ 4 „ li 1 „ « — 18 ft ft 10 „ 9 „ 2 „ 7 2 „ = 1 oz. 16 „ 11 „ 11 „ = 10 „ 0 „ 121 3 „ = 2 „ 4 » 61 ,, 12 = 10 „ 18 18 4 , - 3 „ 12 ii 22 „ 13 „ 11 .. 16 „ 231 5 „ = 4 „ 11 5? 3| „ 14 „ = 12 „ 15 „ 5 6 „ = 5 „ 9 ft & r> 15 „ = 13 „ 13 „ 101 7 „ = 6 „ 7 ,t 141 « 16 „ = 14 „ 11 „ 16 175 oz. Troy = 192 oz. Avoirdupois. i6 Old English Plate . [CHAP. I. The weight of an article of plate was always given in ounces and pennyweights ; thus 5 lb. 5 oz. 5 dwts. would be called 65 oz. 5 dwts, but it is now-a-days given in ounces and decimal parts of an ounce, in compliance with modern legislation on the subject. It will be convenient also to remember that a pound Troy of standard gold is coined in England into 46-H- sovereigns, the weight of a sovereign being 128*27447 gr. A pound Troy of sterling silver is coined into 66 shillings, the weight of a shilling being 87*27272 gr., and of a sixpence 48*68686 gr. New silver coins, therefore, to the amount of 5s. 6cl. will weigh an ounce Troy, and could be used at that rate as a substitute for ordinary weights on an emergency. The intrinsic value of plate made of sterling standard silver would be at present (1886) prices about 4s. per ounce. MINT PRICES FOR GOLD. Lastly, dividing the number of sovereigns contained in one pound Troy of standard gold by twelve, the value of an ounce of such gold (22 carat) will be found to be ^£3 17s. 10 J d., or 3s. 6-J d. for each -d T part (or carat) of fine gold in the ounce weight. The following table gives the value per ounce of all the other qualities of gold that it has been necessary to mention, at this Mint price. No account is taken of the material used for alloying the gold, which would in any case be of trifling value. The alloying metal in an ounce of 22 carat gold, if sterling silver alone were used for the alloy, would hardly be worth fourpence at the present market price of silver : in other words the silver in a sovereign made of such an alloy, would be worth less than 5 farthings. £ s. d. 21 carats (or pure gold) 4 4 11| per oz. 23 car. 3^ gr. (old gold coin. See table, p. 8) 4 4 6^ „ 22 car. (present gold coin and first goldware standard) 3 17 10| ,, 20 car. (gold coin temp. Henry VIII. See table, p. 8. Also an Irish standard) 3 10 9^ „ 19i car. (touch of Paris. See table, p. 8) 3 7 11J ., 18 car. (second goldware standard) 3 3 8| „ 15 car. (third ditto) 2 13 1 „ 12 car. (fourth ditto) 2 2 5f „ 9 car. (fifth ditto) 1 11 10J „ CHAPTER II. THE MEDIAEVAL GUILDS OF GOLDSMITHS IN FRANCE AND ENGLAND — THE GOLD- SMITHS’ COMPANY OF LONDON — REGULATIONS OF THE GOLDSMITHS’ GUILD AT MONTPELLIER— CHARTERS OF THE LONDON GOLDSMITHS AND EARLY LEGISLATION RELATING TO THEM AND THEIR MARKS — THE CORONATION REGALIA— THE BANKER-GOLDSMITHS — LEGISLATION FROM THE TIME OF CHARLES II. — TABLE OF LONDON MARKS. There are no articles in the manufacture of which such extensive frauds can be committed in so small a compass as in those made of the precious metals, and there are no frauds more difficult of detection by ordinary persons. We have seen, too, that whilst a certain amount of base metal must needs he introduced into all such articles, it is only by a minute scientific examination that the proportion of base metal so introduced can he known for certain, and but few persons can possess either the skill or the means to conduct the necessary operations. The great profit to he made by fraudulent practices, the difficulty of detection, and the consequent probability of escape from it and from punishment, have at all times exposed the dishonest workman to irresistible temptations. In very early times, those who carried on particular trades or handicrafts were accustomed to form themselves into guilds or fraternities for the purpose of protecting and regulating the trade, or mysteiy as it was called, which they exercised. These were at subsequent periods incorporated by royal charters, which gave them power and authority to carry out these objects more effectually. Amongst such associations, those of the goldsmiths seem to have been early formed in many countries of Europe. In 1260 it became necessary for the provost of Paris to issue a code of statutes for the regulation of the goldsmiths, who already existed there as a corporate body. Not only was gold of an inferior quality substituted for good gold, but articles made of laten were gilt and palmed off for gold, and pewter was silvered and sold for the genuine metal. In these statutes, gold is ordered to he of “the touch of Paris,” and silver as good as “ Sterlings” ( esterlins ), which was the standard of the English coin, as we have seen. In 1300 the mark of Paris was known even abroad, for it is referred to in the English Wardrobe Accounts of that year (28 Edw, I.) in these terms : — 1 8 Old English Plate . [chap. it. “ 8 coclear’ argenti signata in collo signo Parisius, scilt, de quodam flore glegelli.” A second and more extensive code was issued by John II. of France, in tlie shape of Letters of Confirmation given at St. Ouen in Aug. 1855,* when it was ordered that every goldsmith who was approved by the masters of the craft should have a puncheon with a counter- mark of his own. Amongst other things they were forbidden to work in gold unless it be of the touch of Paris, or better, and the statutes add that this standard is better than all the gold which the}^ work in other lands ( en mille terres), and that its fineness is nineteen and one- fifth carats. They are also forbidden to work in base metal, to use false stones of glass, or to put coloured foil beneath real stones. Their silver was to be argent de roy , 11 deniers 12 grains fine,t and jurors (prudhommes) were appointed to guard the trade, with power to punish those who worked in bad metal. At Montpellier the gold- smiths in the fourteenth century constituted a fraternity governed by statutes, and they had a standard of their own, which, however, does not seem to have been a high one, since silver might contain one-third part of alloy, or such silver as would come white out of the fire, and gold of fourteen carats fine might be worked. They were expressly forbidden to manufacture articles in gilt or silvered copper or brass, save ornaments and utensils for churches, to mount real stones in jewellery of base metal, or to set false stones in gold or silver. We shall presently see how much light the history of the goldsmiths of Montpellier throws upon that of their English brethren. At Nuremberg and Augsburg, cities most famous for their metal- workers, as well as in many other places, similar guilds of goldsmiths, regulated by statutes, existed. In England a fraternity or guild of goldsmiths had existed from an early period, for in 1180, the twenty-sixth year of the reign of Henry II., it was amongst other guilds amerced for being adulterine, that is, set up without the king’s licence. It was not, however, incorporated by charter for nearly a hundred and fifty years after this time, although it had special duties assigned to it, one of the duties of the wardens of the craft being to protect their trade against fraudulent workers by holding official examinations of the above-mentioned kinds, and placing marks upon articles so examined. * Collection de pieces relatives a Vhistoire de France, par C. Leber, Paris, 1838. Yol. XIX. 343. f Denier was the term used in France to denote the fineness of silver as carat is for gold. The silver is divided into twelve deniers, and each denier into two oboles or twenty -four grains ; hence silver of twelve deniers was pure, and eleven deniers one obole had only one twenty-fourth part alloy. This quality was the Argent de Roy. CHAP. II.] Early Goldsmiths Guilds. 19 Some such marks must have been necessary in order to certify to the purchaser, and for other purposes, a certain standard purity of metal in articles so examined, and the official stamps by which it was certified seem to have been the origin of the marks which are found on the gold and silver plate of most countries. Every person who is possessed of any article of gold or silver plate, has, most probably, observed a small group of marks stamped upon some part of it. Few, perhaps, have regarded them in any other light than as a proof that the article so marked is made of the metal of which it is professed to he made, and that the metal itself is of a certain purity. And this is, in fact, the ultimate intention of these marks : but besides this the archaeologist can often deduce from them other important and interesting information, — as to the year in which any article bearing them was made ; the place at which it was made, or at all events, assayed ; the maker’s name, and other particulars. As regards England, an historical notice of the Goldsmiths’ Company of London and its charters, and the legislation which from time to time has regulated the trade of the goldsmith, will elucidate in its course the meaning of all the marks to be found on English plate. Some notes of the provincial guilds and assay offices, including those of Scotland and Ireland, and of their respective marks, will be reserved for separate chapters. Except for the early trace of a guild in 1180, which has already been noticed, we have to wait until the commencement of the thir- teenth century before we come to any definite regulation of the mystery of the goldsmiths of London, and even then their formal incorporation had not yet taken place. However, by this time they were a numerous and powerful craft, for in an affray which occurred in 1267 between the goldsmiths and the tailors, those trades met and fought to the number of 500 men on each side, of whom some were killed, the dead being, it is said, thrown into the Thames, and others wounded before the bailiffs of the city could part them and apprehend the ringleaders, some of whom were hanged A' But, truth, to say, their turbulence was not their only failing, for the frauds that seemed so common in France had their place also in England, and by the year 1288 were of such extent as to call for a mandate from the king, to be found in the Close Bolls of that year.f This, which is entitled “ De anro fabricando m crvitnte Londoniarmn ,” commands the mayor and Chronicles of the Mayor and Sheriffs of Herbert’s History of the London Livery London , edited by H. T. Riley, London, - 1 Companies. 1863. Such affrays are also mentioned in + Close Roll, 22 Henry III., m. 6. C 2 20 Old English Plate. [CHAP. II. aldermen to clioose six of the more discreet goldsmiths of the city, who were to superintend the craft, seeing that no craftsman worked any gold of which a mark was not worth a hundred shillings at least, nor any silver of less intrinsic value than the king’s money — “ quod non valeat in se quantum valeat moneta Regis” They were also to prevent anyone working in secret, or anywhere hut in the public street, to see that gold bore no colour but its own, except in the case of gold thread, and that no one put gold upon laton or copper. There are also provisions as to the use of precious and counterfeit stones. Fifty years later, the first actual statute on the subject, passed in 1300, recognizes these discreet goldsmiths by the name of wardens, and for the first time establishes their powers on a firm basis, ordaining as follows, viz. (28 Edward I., Stat. 3, cap. 20) : — “ That no goldsmith should make any vessel, jewel, or other thing of gold or silver unless it he of good and true alloy, Le. f gold of the standard of the touch of Paris (tuche de Parys) and silver of the sterling alloy, or better ( argent del alloy de le esterling on de meilleur), and that none work worse silver than money. And that no vessel of silver depart out of the hands of the workers until it be assayed by the wardens of the craft, and marked with the leopard’s head (e q’ele soit signee de une teste de leopart). That the wardens (gardiens) should go from shop to shop ( de shope en shope) among the goldsmiths and assay ( assaient ) the gold, and if they should find any other, it should be forfeit to the King. That no false stones should he set in gold, and that all the good towns of England where any goldsmith he dwelling shall be ordered accord- ing to this E statute as they of London he, and that one shall come from every good town for all the residue that he dwelling in the same unto London for to be ascertained of their Touch. And if any goldsmith be attainted that he hath done otherwise, he shall he punished by imprisonment and by ransom at the King’s pleasure.” Here, then, we have mention, not only of wardens of the craft, but of an assay and of a distinct mark for standard metal. Mr. Octavius Morgan notes that the phraseology of this statute more than suggests that such a mark was now ordered for the first time, it being termed “ une teste.” This is indeed an important step in the history of which we are tracing the course. It is the earliest mention, too, of an assay. Now that the duty of the wardens is laid down, we have naturally not long to wait for the regular incorporation of a Goldsmiths’ guild in London, and in 1327 it was so incorporated by letters-patent from CHAP. II.] The London Goldsmiths . 2 1 Edward III., under the name of “ The Wardens and Commonalty of the Mystery of Goldsmiths of the City of London.” This charter, which is in old French, and is dated 30 May, 1 Edw. III., is given at length, both in French and English, in Herbert’s History of the London Livery Companies. It first recites and then grants as follows : — that the goldsmiths of our City of London had by their petition exhibited to the King and Council in Parliament holden at Westminster, shown that theretofore no private merchants or strangers were wont to bring into this land any money coined, hut plate of silver to exchange for our coin ; that it had been ordained that all of the trade of goldsmiths were to sit in their shops in the High-street of Cheap, and that no silver or gold plate ought to he sold in the city of London except in the King’s Exchange or in Cheap, among the goldsmiths, and that publicly, to the end that persons in the trade might inform themselves whether the seller came lawfully by it : but that of late both private merchants and strangers bring from foreign lands counterfeit sterling whereof the pound is not worth sixteen sols of the right sterling, and of this money none can know the right value hut by melting it down ; and that many of the trade of goldsmiths do keep shops in obscure streets, and do buy vessels of gold and silver secretly without inquiring whether such vessels were stolen or come lawfully by, and immediately melting it down, make it into plate, and sell it to merchants trading beyond sea, and so make false work of gold, silver, and jewels, in which they set glass of divers colours, counterfeiting right stones, and put more alloy in their silver than they ought, which they sell to such as have no skill in such things ; and that the cutlers cover tin with silver so subtilely and with such sleight that the same cannot he discovered nor separated, and so sell the tin for fine silver, to the great damage and deceipt of us and our people ; we, with the assent of our lords spiritual and temporal, and the commons of our realme, will and grant for us and our heirs that henceforth no one shall bring into this land any sort of money, but only plate of fine silver, and that no plate of gold or silver he sold to sell again, or he carried out of the kingdom, hut shall he sold openly for private use ; that none of the trade shall keep any shop, except in Cheap, that it may he seen that their work he good ; that those of the trade may by virtue of these presents elect honest and sufficient men, best skilled in the trade, to inquire of the matters aforesaid, and that they who are so chosen reform what defects they shall find, and inflict punishment on the offenders, and that by the help of the mayor and sheriffs, if need he ; that in all trading cities in England where goldsmiths reside, the 22 [CHAP. II. Old English Plate. same ordinance be observed as in London, and that one or two of every such city or town for the rest of the trade shall come to London to be ascertained of their touch of gold, and there to have a stamp of a puncheon of a leopard’s head marked upon their work as it was anciently ordained. For some years they were governed by the provisions of this charter, but in 1363 further legislation became necessary, and by an Act of that year (37 Edward III. cap. 7) it was ordained that no goldsmith, as well in London as elsewhere within the realm, should Avork any gold or silver but of the alloy of good sterling ( alloy cle bon csterlyng ) ; that every master goldsmith should have a mark by himself which should be known by them who should be assigned to survey their work and allay ; that the goldsmiths should not set their mark till their work was assayed ; and that after the assay made, the surveyor should set the king’s mark upon it, and then the goldsmith his mark for which he should answer ; that no goldsmith should charge for silver vessel but Is. 6cl. for the pound of two marks as at Paris ; that no silversmith should meddle with gilding ; and that no gilder should work in silver. This brings us another stage, and introduces us to a maker’s mark for the first time in England. We have a standard mark since 1300, and now a maker’s mark dating from 1363. It is pretty clear that in the fourteenth century, owing to the frauds committed, a great move was made throughout Europe with respect to goldsmiths, France and perhaps Montpellier taking the lead. Turn we therefore, by the way, to Montpellier, of whose history the Publications dc la Societe Archeologique de Montpellier give many interesting particulars, and we find that by 1355 a dispute which had arisen between the consuls of the town and the goldsmiths, in consequence of the great abuses introduced into the trade of the latter, led to the following regulations of that year : — That all vessels and works of silver made by the argentiers of Montpellier must be of the standard of eleven deniers and one obole, or twelve grains, at the least.* The goldsmiths were to make two patterns or trial pieces of silver, of the standard of eleven deniers fourteen grains, marked with the puncheon of Montpellier (for Philippe le Hardi had, in 1275, ordained that each city should have a particular mark for works in silver), after which the goldsmiths should work with an allowance of two grains. One of these trial * See note, p. 18 . CHAP. II. J Their First Charter. pieces should be kept at the consulate, and the other by the warden of the goldsmiths. That a third trial piece shall he made of eleven deniers and one obole, also marked, which should remain with the consuls for trial with suspected works. Every master silversmith should mark with a particular mark the pieces of his work, and deliver them himself to the warden. The warden, before marking the piece with the puncheon of Montpellier, should remove a portion of the silver, called, in the language of Montpellier, “ borihl ” (a technical term for a portion of metal removed with a buril, burin or graver, for the purpose of the assay), which he should put into a box, keeping a separate box for each workman, and once or twice a year make an assay of these “borihls,” and if the standard was found below the eleven deniers one ohole they should denounce the worker to the consuls, who should make a second assay, and if they found the fraud confirmed, should deliver him over to justice. Moreover the wardens might break such articles as seemed to them insufficient. In the original documents nothing is said of the method of performing the operation of the assay ; hut as it is expressly ordered that in assaying the trial pieces and “ borihls ” the same ashes (probably hone-ashes to form the crucible), lead and fire, should he used, it is clear that the assay was by the cupel. Nothing had hitherto been done or said about gold ; but though less worked than silver there were equal abuses ; and in 1401 the consuls and wardens of the mystery, assisted by several argentiers, made a regulation in presence of the consuls of the city, by which the standard of gold, which originally was only fourteen carats and had by a subse- quent decree been raised to eighteen carats, was now reduced to sixteen carats ; and there is here a question of the trial of gold by the “ touch,” showing that it was then in use. In the fifteenth century abuses and frauds in the trade had greatly multiplied. Public clamour was raised against the principal silversmiths for working below the standard of 1355. A process was instituted against them in 1427. The consuls seized several of their works, had them assayed, found them fraudulent, and made the makers appear before the tribunal. In their defence they pleaded that the ordinances of 1355 were obsolete with regard to small “ orfevreries.” They were condemned to pay a fine of ten marks of silver each, and on appeal the sentence was confirmed. They claimed exemption from marking girdles and small works. An inquest was held, and the following ordinances resulted, which were solemnly renewed in 1436 with still stricter conditions, and they show with what care the fabrication of works of gold and silver was regulated. 24 Old English Plate . [CHAP. II. To ensure the legal standard they ordained, besides the ordinary pre- caution of the box, the “ borihls,” the trial pieces, and the name of the silversmith, that the name of the warden of the mystery, inscribed on the register of the city and on the private book of the silversmiths, should be followed by one of the letters of the alphabet, which should he reproduced beneath the shield of arms ( ecusson ) of the town on each work, in order that it might be known under what warden it was made. These proceedings of the goldsmiths of Montpellier are highly interest- ing, since they not only give us an account of the frauds and the alteration of the standard, together with the particulars of the assay, which in its system with the box and trial-pieces bears a very strong analogy to our trial of the Pyx,* but also give us the date, origin and establishment of three very important marks, viz. the mark of the country or city, the mark of the maker, and the annual letter, two of which we had already adopted in this country, whilst the use of the third, the annual letter, was soon to he established. If we may turn aside for a moment to see how the goldsmiths put their powers into actual use, we gather that their original charter must have served its purpose to some extent. Proceedings taken against one Peter Randolfe, a Latoner, are enough to show that it was at all events not a dead letter in 1876, for upon interrogation for exposing two circlets for mazers of mixed silver, we find him promising not to interfere with the goldsmiths’ trade again.! The names of many of the great London goldsmiths of this gene- ration are known. Thomas Hessey was the king’s goldsmith in 1866, and Nicholas Twyford held the same office shortly afterwards ; the latter is mentioned in accounts of 1879. The names of John de * The important duty of testing the purity of the coinage from time to time has been entrusted for ages to the Goldsmiths’ Company. The ceremony of doing this has been conducted with the same formalities from time immemorial, and is called 4 4 The trial of the Pyx.” Such a trial is known to have taken place in 9 & 10 Edw. I., and it has been held at short but irregular intervals ever since ; it is now an annual event. A specimen coin, taken formerly from each “journey” or day’s work, but in modern days from each melting of metal, whether gold or silver, is placed in a chest kept at the Mint, called the Pyx. At the proper time a jury of the Goldsmiths’ Company is summoned, who after being sworn and solemnly charged, proceed to an assay of the coins found in the Pyx, and to compare their quality with the standard trial plates in the custody of the Warden of the Standards. Their verdict is the deliverance of the authorities of the Mint, who are virtually placed upon their trial. Since the Coinage Act of 1870, the proceedings have been somewhat shorn of their circumstance, owing to the jury being summoned to Goldsmiths’ Hall, and there charged by the Queen’s Remembrancer, instead of by the Lord Chancellor himself at Westminster, where I the assay was formerly conducted, in an | apartment specially prepared for the pur- pose. The mode of procedure thenceforward to be adopted on these occasions is com- pletely set forth in the above Coinage Act (33 Viet. c. 10), and in the Queen’s Order in Council of 29 June, 1871. + Riley’s Memorials of London and London Life in the XIII., XIV., and XV. centuries. London, 1868, p. 398. CHAP. II.] Ordinances of Montpellier . 25 Chichester and Thomas Reynham, JolinHiltoft and also his executors, all occur in the Wardrobe Accounts as enjoying royal patronage between this time and the end of the century. The great goldsmith, Sir Drew Barentyn, who died in 1415, was a man of more than civic note. Here, however, the charter of Edward III. was found insufficient for want of proper persons being named in it ; therefore Richard II. in 1892-3 re-incorporated them by another charter dated 6 Feb. 16 Ric. II., confirming the first and giving them power to choose wardens and other officers. Edward IV. in 1462 not only confirmed the charter of Richard II., but constituted the Goldsmiths’ Company a body corporate and politic, with perpetual succession, power to use a common seal, hold lands, etc., and by this charter dated 30 May, 2 Ed. IV., invested them with a privilege of searching, inspecting, trying, and regulating all gold and silver wares, in the city of London, and the suburbs thereof, and in all fairs and markets, and all cities, towns and boroughs, and all other places whatsoever throughout our kingdom of England, with power to punish offenders for working adulterated gold or silver. These powers were continually exercised, and from the records of the Company it appears that periodical progresses through the country were made by the assay-wardens for that purpose. Several kings at various times have given them new charters, enlarging and confirm- ing the older ones. The latest are Inspeximus Charters of James I. (2 Jac. I.), and Charles II. (18 Car. II.), which recite and confirm all those previously granted. The latter of these is recited in the Act of 12 Geo. II., c. 26, and empowered the wardens to commit offenders to prison and to set fines upon them. The guild thus incorporated is now one of the greatest and wealthiest of the City Companies, and one to which the archseologist and antiquary are indebted for the ready information and assistance it has given to those who have from time to time sought permission to consult its records, which, commencing about 1331, are carried down to the present day. They consist of the wardens’ accounts, which begin in that year and amount to many large volumes, the ordinances, and other hooks relating to their estates, all of which contain curious and interesting- particulars. The members of the fraternity were originally all gold- smiths, as mentioned in their first charter, and the Company is governed by a Prime Warden, three other wardens, and twenty-one assistants, with a livery of 150 members, exclusive of honorary members and members by special grant. The wardens are now annually elected on May 29tli ; previously, however, to the Restoration, 26 [chap. ii. Old English Plate. in compliance with their ordinances, St. Dunstan’s Day, being that of their patron saint, was their proper clay of election. On the day of election, when the new Prime Warden enters upon the duties of his office, the new punches for the marks haying been prepared, are delivered by him to the officers of the Assay Office. Formerly the old punches were all preserved, but not many years ago the accumulation being very great and found inconvenient, it was considered that such a mass of old iron was useless, and they were destroyed. It is much to be regretted that impressions were not taken of them on a copper-plate previous to their destruction, though it is hardly probable that there were any earlier than the time of the fire of London in 1666. The ordinances or statutes of the Company are contained in a fine MS. on vellum, with illuminated initial letters. It is therein stated that “ tliys boke was made and ordeynyd by Hugh Bryce, Altherman, Henry Coote, Mylys Aclys, and Willy am Palmer, wardens, the xx day of September in the yere of our lorcle god mcccclxxviij and in the xviij yere of the Beigne of King Edward the fourth. Humfrey Hay- ford then Mayre of the Cyte of lonclon, John Stokker and Henry Colett, Slieryfiys of the same Cyte.” The index of the same volume is further described as follows: “ Tliys Kalendar was made and ordeynyd for this boke by Henry Coote, Stephyn Kelke, John Ernest, and Alen Newman, wardens, the last day of Augustin the yere of oure lorde god mcccclxxxiij and in the ffurst yere of the Keygne of King Piichard the thiyd. Sir Edmond Shaa, Knyght, then Mayre of the Cyte of london, Willia Whyte and John Mathew, Sheryffys of the same Cyte.” It contains first the oaths for the wardens and officers ; and secondly the ordinances for the government of the Company, which chiefly consist of regulations for the masters of the craft and the taking, keeping and conduct of apprentices ; but also “ for the working of gold and silver to the standard, and how it shall be delivered.” The following may be quoted as examples : — “ Also it is ordeyned that no goldsmith of England, nor nowhere else within the realme, work no manner of vessel nor any other thing of gold nor silver, but if it be of the verry alloy according to the stan- dard of England, called sterling money or better.” “ That no manner of vessel or any other thing be borne out from the hands of the workers, nor sold till it be assayed by the wardens of the craft or their deputy, the assayer ordained therefore, and that it be marked with the lyperde’s head crowned according to the acts of diverse parliaments, and the mark of the maker thereof.” chap, ii.] Records of the Goldsmiths Company . 27 No worker was to be a freeman of the Company until lie liad been apprenticed seven years ; and the ordinances were to be read publicly on St. Dunstan’s Day. At the end of the book are some additional ordinances of the year 1507, being the twenty-second of Henry VII., by which it was provided that no goldsmith should put to sale any vessel or other work of gold or silver until he had set his mark upon it ; that he should take it to the assay house of the Hall of the Goldsmiths to be assayed by the assayer, who should set ins mark upon it, and should deliver it to the warden, who should set on it the leopard's head crowned. Again, in another MS. book 011 vellum which has the arms of the Goldsmiths’ Company emblazoned on the tirst page, and contains ordinances dated July 5th, 1518, being the fifth year of Henry VIII., we find that it is ordained that before any work of gold or silver is put to sale the maker shall set on it his own mark, that it shall be assayed by the assayer who shall set on it his mark, and that the wardens shall mark it with the leopard’s head crowned. Here then in both these sets of ordinances we have three distinct marks mentioned : the maker’s, the assayer’s, and the leopard’s head or king’s mark. What this assayer’s mark was we are not definitely told, but it must almost necessarily be the annual letter, now therefore to be added to the leopard’s head of 1300 and the maker’s mark of 1863. We shall give reasons when dealing specially with this mark for attributing its inauguration to the year 1478. The course of State legislation had proceeded pari passu with the ordinances of the Goldsmiths’ Company, and before passing the ill- omened gulf in the history of English plate which occurs between 1513 and the commencement of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, we must bring it down to the earlier of these dates. And first comes a statute which, but for the fact that it is not found amongst “the statutes” properly so called, and seems therefore to have been only provisional and not confirmed on the assembling of parliament, would appear to have crippled the new-found powers of the gold- smiths’ guild, and to have rendered them inoperative outside the city of London. Indeed, it was only assented that this ordinance should commence at the feast of St. John, and should last till the next parliament, to try in the meantime if it were profitable or not. It is found in 1379 on the Eolls of Parliament of the second year of Bichard II., No. 30, and would have ordained not only that each smith should put his mark 011 his work, but that it should be marked with the mark of the city or borough wherein it was assayed, and that 28 Old English Plate. [CHAP. II. the assay should belong to the mayors, etc., of the cities and boroughs, with the aid of the master of the mint. For the reasons mentioned, this statute was probably not acted upon very generally : though, as we shall presently see, in the case of York, a recognised touch is men- tioned in civic records of 1410. The next Act, in 1881 (5 Richard II., cap. 2) forbade the export of gold and silver in any shape, or et argent si bien monoie vessell plate* et joialx. These provisions are reinforced in 1402 by another Act forbidding any person to carry gold or silver in money, vessell or plate out of the realm, without the king’s licence. In 1404 (5 Henry IV., cap. 18), in order to prevent frauds, it was enacted that no artificer nor other man, whatsoever he be, shall gild nor silver any locks, rings, beads, candlesticks, harness for girdles, chalices, hilts, pomels of swords, powder-boxes, nor covers for cups ( pur hanapes) made of copper or latten, on pain to forfeit to the king c shillings at every time that he shall be found guilty; but that chalices excepted, artificers may work ornaments for the Church of copper and latten, and the same gild and silver, so that at the foot or some other part, the copper and the latten shall be plain, to the intent that a man may see whereof the thing is made for to eschew the deceit aforesaid. In 1414 (2 Henry V., Stat. 2, cap. 4) it was enacted for that the goldsmiths of England, of their covin and ordinances, will not sell the wares of their mystery gilt, but at the double price of the weight of silver of the same, which seemetli to the king very outrageous and too excessive a price ; the king for the ease of his people hath ordained that all goldsmiths of England shall gild no silver wares worse than * The word “ plate” here stands for bar or sheet gold and silver, rather than for articles made of them, which were called “vasa” and “jocalia,” or, in English, “vessel,” until about the middle of the fifteenth century. In the wills and inven- tories of the later half of that century, the word begins to occur in its modern sense ; to give a single example, one Thomas Brygg, in 1494, bequeaths “ omnia mea vasa argen- tea voc’ le plate,” using the ordinary Latin word and the less familiar term then just coming into use in juxtaposition. In the following statutes of the fourteenth century, ‘ ‘ plate ’ ’ appears to mean merely the wrought or flattened metal, which is a more strictly accurate use of the word, derived as it is from a common origin with the Greek ttXcitvs, our own fctt, and the Spanish plata , than its later and secondary application as a general term to vessels I formed of such metal : — 9 Edw. III. Stat. 2. Statute of Money : c. 1. “Argent en plate ne vessel dor ne dargent.” 1 1 Monoie plate ou vessel dor ne dargent.” | 27 Edw. III. Stat. 2. The Statute of the Staple : “ Plate of silver and billets of gold.” A “plate of ale” is the expression used at Trinity College, Cambridge, for one of the silver tankards purchased by fellow-com- ! moners for their own use, and left by them as a parting present to the college (Words- worth’s Social Life at the English Universi- ties in the 18 th Century ) ; and the same I term is applied at Queen’s College, in the sister university, to the caudle- cups with ring-handles which are now used for beer. CHAP. II.] Acts of Parliament . 29 of the alloy of the English sterling ; and that they take for a pound of Troy gilt but 46 shillings and 8 pence at the most ; and of greater weight and less according to the quantity and weight of the same ; and that which shall be by them gilt from henceforth shall be of a reasonable price and not excessive, and if any goldsmith do contrary to this statute, he shall forfeit to the king the value of the thing so sold. In 1420 (8 Henry V., c. 8) it was forbidden to gild any sheaths or any metal hut silver, and the ornaments of Holy Church ; or to silver any metal hut knights’ spurs, and all the apparel that pertaineth to a baron and above that estate. A more important statute now follows, viz., that of 1428 (2 Henry VI., cap. 14), by which it was ordained that no goldsmith or jeweller within the City of London should sell any article of silver unless it was as fine as sterling, nor set it to sell before it be touched with the touch of the leopard’s head if it may reasonably bear the same touch, and also with the mark or sign of the workman of the same, upon pain of forfeiture of the double as afore is said ; and that the mark or sign of every goldsmith be known to the wardens of the same craft ; and if the keeper of the touch shall touch any harness with the leopard’s head, except it be as fine as sterling, shall for everything so proved not so good in alloy as the said sterling, forfeit the double value to the king and the party. By this statute also it is ordained that the city of York, Newcastle upon Tine, Lincoln, Norwich, Bristol, Salisbury, and Coventry, shall have divers touches, and further that no goldsmith anywhere shall work silver of worse alloy than the sterling, and shall set his mark upon it before he set it to sale, upon the same penalties as if in London. This is the first mention of provincial assay towns, of which more will be said in a succeeding chapter. Next, in 1477 (17 Edward IV., cap. 1), by reason of the provisions of the Act of 2 Henry VI., cap. 14, having been daily broken by the goldsmiths and other workers of silver, as well in London as else- where, it was directed inter alia that no goldsmith or worker of gold or silver should work or put to sale any gold under the fineness of eighteen carats, nor silver unless it be as fine as sterling, except such thing as requiretli solder ; also that no goldsmith work or set to sale harness of silver plate, or jewel of silver, from the feast of Easter, within the city of London or within two leagues ( leakez ) of London, before it be touched with the leopard’s head crowned, such as may bear the said touch, and also with a mark or sign of the worker of the same so wrought, upon pain of forfeiture of the double value of such 3 ° Old English Plate. [chap. II. silver wrought and sold to the contrary; that the mark or sign of every goldsmith be committed to the wardens of the same mystery ; and if it be found that the keeper of the touch of the leopard’s head crowned, do mark or touch any harness with the leopard’s head, if it be not as fine in alloy as sterling, he shall forfeit double the value of the silver ; and that the craft of goldsmiths of London shall be answerable for the non-sufficiency of the warden. This statute was enacted for seven years, and was afterwards re-enacted for twenty years in 1489, and again for twenty years in 1552 by 7 Edward VI., cap. 6. In 1488-9 (4 Henry VII., Pari. 8, cap. 2) it was found that whereas in previous times finers and parters of gold and silver had used to fine and part all the gold and silver needful for the mints of London, Calais, Canterbury, York, ai:d Durham, and the fellowship of gold- smiths, under the rules and orders of those mints, but now they dwelt abroad in every part of the realm, and out of the rules aforesaid, and carried on their trade so that men can get no fine silver ; and it was enacted that the finers and parters should not alloy fine gold nor silver, nor sell anything else, nor to any persons except the officers of mints and the goldsmiths ; that silver be made so fine that it bear 1 2 penny- weight of alloy in the pound weight, and yet be as good as sterling, and that all finers set their marks upon it. We have now brought down both the ordinances of the goldsmiths and those of the statute-book to the time of Henry VIII., and it will presently be seen what a disastrous period in the history of the art has been reached. We have come to the time when the accumulated treasures of the Church were swept away, and the wealth of lay corporations extorted for the service of the crown and state. Monastic and cathedral plate disappears on the Reformation in the reign of Henry VIII., the possessions of the parish churches follow at the end of that of Edward VI., whilst the “benevolences” of Queen Mary ransack the treasure-rooms of the great secular guilds and companies, and end the history of English Plate for a time. A number of goldsmiths’ names occur in the Church inventories of Edward VI., and it may be as well to give a few of them for the chance of their initials being here and there recognised on vessels made by them for the reformed use, some of which, as we shall see, still remain. One, Christopher Terry, is noted about 1515 ; and between 1580 and 1553 may be found working at their craft in London Thomas Calton, John Palterton, Raufe Latliom, John Waberley, Thomas Metcalfe, John Danyell, Robert Reyns, Fabyan Wytliers, and Robert Wygge — Wigg and Dickson are mentioned in the inventory of CHAP. II.] Acts of Parliament . St. George’s Chapel, Windsor — and to these must he added the name of a lady, one Margery Herkins, who carried on business in Lombard Street. In the early years of Queen Elizabeth the names that most frequently occur are those of Robert Tayleboys, found from 1559 to 1572, Thomas Muschampe, who made a communion cup for Chelms- ford, which is unfortunately not now in existence, and Thomas Turpyn. Mr. Dericke, of the Queen’s Arms in Cheapside, was one of the Queen’s goldsmiths at the beginning of her reign, and it was under the auspices of this respectable tradesman that the first lottery of which there is any record was brought out in 1569 ; a little later one Hughe Ivayle held a similar appointment amongst the Queen’s servants. The pedigrees and coats of arms of no fewer than thirteen gold- smiths were entered at the visitation of London by the heralds in 1568, those of the above-mentioned Anthony Dericke, Thomas Metcalfe, and Thomas Muschampe among the number. In this record Affabel Partridge, Esq., is styled “Principal Goldsmith ” to Queen Elizabeth. The others were George Dalton, Henry Gilbert, John Mabbe, Francis Heton, Christopher Wace, Francis Jackson, Henry Gaynsford, and Thomas Gardiner. Four of these were members of the Court of Assistants of the Goldsmiths’ Companyin 1566,Metcalfe, — Muschampe, Mabbe, and Gardiner. There were sixty-eight goldsmiths living in Chepe in 1569, besides some twenty in Lombard Street. These were the chief resorts of the craft. It is curiously seldom that the name of a maker can be traced by the sign of his shop forming part of his registered mark. It will be inferred that brighter days had now succeeded to a quarter of a century of plunder and destruction. The debased standards of the last twenty or thirty years were raised once more to their former purity, and none knew better than the Queen herself the importance of this step, in which she took much personal interest. But it was not at first a very popular measure, and the promulgation by royal proclamation was necessary of a “ summarie of certaine reasons which moved the Queen’s majestie to procede in reformations of her base and coarse monies, and to reduce them to their values in sorte as they may be turned to fine monies,” before the public, who saw only the loss that the reform would occasion them on the coin then in their possession, realised the great benefit it would he to the nation. This was dated from Hampton Court on 29th September, 1560, and on 19th February, 1560-61, the base money was called in also by proclamation. The Queen went herself in state to the Mint, and striking some 3 2 Old English Plate. [chap. n. coins with her own royal hand, gave them to those standing about her, ordering that a medal should he struck to commemorate the event. The Minutes of the Goldsmiths’ Company record that the diet tried on 18th June, 1561, was “ the first dyett of the newe Standard.” Stringent measures, too, were adopted to prevent fraud and to preserve the purity of the re-established standard. Twenty-eight goldsmiths were fined in the course of 1566, a not exceptional year in this respect ; and amongst them are some of the leading members of the craft. Legislation also was resorted to, and in 1576, on February 8 (18 Eliz. cap. 15), it was enacted with this view, that after the 20tli of April then next ensuing, no goldsmith should work, sell, or exchange, any plate or ware of gold less in fineness than twenty-two “ carrects ” (carats), and that he use no sother amell or other stuffing more than is necessary for finishing the same, nor make, sell, or exchange, any wares of silver less in fineness than 11 ounces 2 penny- weight, nor take above twelvepence for the ounce of gold or pound of silver “ beyond the fashion ” (more than the buyer shall or may he allowed for the same at the Queen’s exchange or mint) ; nor put to sale any ware before he hath set his own mark on so much thereof as may conveniently hear the same ; and if after the above day any gold or silver wares shall he touched for good by the wardens or masters of the mystery, and there shall afterwards be found fraud or deceit therein, the wardens shall pay forfeit the value of the thing so marked. The Goldsmiths’ Company, resuming its good work, seems to have exercised its powers even harshly. There are constant entries in the Minute-Books of plate broken and penalties exacted for silver work, usually buckles or clasps, but often larger pieces, found on assay to be worse than standard. Great dissatisfaction was given in 1583 by one Thomas Kelynge, then the assayer at Goldsmiths’ Hall, who from over zeal, or baser motives as it was alleged, made himself very unpopular with the craft. Amongst the records of the Mint are preserved some papers detailing “the grefes of us poor goldsmiths against our assay master,” one Richard Mathewe and a fellow crafts- man named Henry Colley charging Kelynge with breaking their plate unjustly, and stating that when they had refashioned a part of the broken plate differently, and sent it in again under another maker’s mark, it passed. Colley describes cutting out part of a condemned platter and making it into a taster which passed, and he further com- plained that out of a nest of bowls or of a tankard of no more than thirty ounces, Kelynge took as much as a quarter of an ounce, or at CHAP. IT.] Frauds in 1597 . 33 least half a quarter, for himself.* There were however faults on both sides, and the strict supervision of the Goldsmiths’ Company was still both exercised and needed, as the following entry found among their records testifies : — “ 4tli May, 1597 — Edward Cole, Attorney General, filed an information against John Moore and Robert Thomas; that whereas it had been heretofore of long time provided by divers laws and statutes for the avoiding deceit and fraud in the making of plate, that every goldsmith should before the sale of any plate by him made, bring the same first to the Goldsmiths’ Hall for trial by assay, to be touched or marked and allowed by the wardens of the said company of Goldsmiths ; the which wardens did by their indenture in their search, find out the aforesaid deceitful workmanship and counterfeit also of plate and puncheons ; yet the said John Moore and R. Thomas being lately made free of the Goldsmiths’ Company, did about three months past make divers parcels of counterfeit plate debased and worse than her Majesty’s standard 12 d and more in the oz. ; and to give appearance to the said counterfeit plate being good and lawful, did thereto put and counterfeit the marks of her Majesty’s Lion, the leopard’s head limited by statute and the alphabetical mark approved by ordinance amongst themselves, which are the private marks of the Goldsmiths’ Hall, and be and remain in the custody of the said wardens and puncheons to be worked and imprinted thereon, and the said John Moore did afterwards sell the same for good and sufficient plate to the defrauding of her Majesty’s subjects, &c.” It remains to be said that they were convicted and sentenced to stand in the pillory at Westminster, with their ears nailed thereto, and with papers above their heads stating their offence to be “ for making false plate and counterfeiting her Majesty’s touch.” They w^ere then put in the pillory at Cheapside, had one ear cut off, and were taken through Foster Lane to Fleet Prison, and had to pay a fine of ten marks. Here we have the first actual mention by name of the Lion and an alphabetical letter, though both had been long in use, the former for about half a century, and the latter for more than double that time. There is nothing now to note for a long time except that in 1624 (21 Jac. I. c. 28) certain portions of the earlier enactments of 28 Edw. I., 87 Edw. III., and 2 Henry VI. were repealed, and that a few years later the goldsmiths’ hall marks were fully recognised as a guarantee of the quality of silver bearing them ; for when Charles I. resorted to forced loans for the means of carrying on the war, warrants. * Public Record Office — Exchequer, Q.Jl. (Mint. Miscell . ), temp. Elk. T) 34 Old English Plate. [(HAP. II. dated from Oxford in 1643, demanded of the individuals to whom they were addressed so much money “or the value thereof in plate, toucht plate at five shillings, and untoucht plate at foure shillings foure pence per ounce.” * In these and such like transactions the goldsmiths bore an important part, and that their business was right profitable is attested by the wealthy and notable men that are found amongst them at this time. Who has not heard of George Heriot, goldsmith to James YI. of Scotland, and of the noble hospital founded by him in Edin- burgh ? A goldsmith by descent, for his father was an eminent Scotch goldsmith and money dealer, like other people he removed to London with his royal master on his accession to the English throne, and there constantly increased in eminence and wealth till his death in 1628-4. The Vyners too, and the Jenners both owed their prosperity to the great business which they carried on as goldsmiths in the middle years of this century. The name of Vyner must be invoked to justify digression for a little while to a subject of considerable archaeological, indeed national, importance. Some six-and-thirty years ago, Mr. Robert Cole, F.S.A., read before the Society of Antiquaries a paper f upon some interesting documents that had then lately come into his possession relating to the Regalia made for the coronation of King Charles II. They were two in number, one of them being the order, dated 20tli June 1662, for the payment from the Royal Treasury to Sir Robert Vyner, his Majesty’s goldsmith, of the sums of £21,978 9s. lid., and £10,000, “for two Crowns, two Sceptres, and a Globe of Gold, set with diamonds, rubyes, sapliires, emeralds, and pearls, St. Edward’s Staff, the Armilla, Ampull, and other the Regalia, all of gold.” The second document was the receipt of Sir Robert Vyner for part of this money, and it bears the signature of Sir Robert Vyner himself, dated July 1, 1662. A third and later document, dated Feb, 23, 1684-5, procured by Mr. Cole in the same way and at the same time as the other two, was afterwards communicated to the Society. It contained not only a list but the weights of the articles comprised in the Regalia, and seemed to have been prepared as a sort of estimate of some of the probable expenses of the approaching coronation of James II., which took place in April, including the providing of articles such as on the former occasion were delivered to the great officers of state for fees. It is of considerable interest, and as the Transactions of the Society of Coll. Top. et Gen. vol. vii., p. 102. t Arcliceologia, vol. xxix., p. 262. chap, il] Coronation Regalia of Charles //. 35 Antiquaries are at the disposal of comparatively few persons, no apology is needed for reprinting it here as follows : * “ A List of y e Regalias provided for his late Ma l y’ s Coronation, and are now in y e Custody of S r Gilbert Talbot, Knt., Master and Treas r of his Ma l r ,s Jewells and Plate, viz 1 — oz. dwt i. gr. li. s. d. Imprim. S‘ Edward’s Crowne .... . . poiz 82 5 16 For y e addition of Gold and Workemanship . 350 00 30 For y e Loane of y e Jewells returned 500 00 00 It m One Crowne of State f poiz 72 01 00 For y e Gold, Jewells, and Workemanship . . . , 7,870 00 00 It m One Scepter with a Dove .... . poiz 34 03 20 For y e Gold, Jewells, and Workemanship 440 00 00 It m One other Scepter with a Cross poiz 32 11 10 For y e Gold Jewells and Workemanship . 1,025 00 00 It m One S l Edward’s Staff e poiz 45 08 08 For y e Gold and Workemanship . • • • . 225 06 02 It m One Gloobe with a Crosse .... poiz 42 07 12 For Gold, Jewells, and Workemanship . 1,150 00 00 It m One Pair of Spurrs . poiz 12 18 00 For Gold and Workemanship .... . 63 07 06 It m Two Armillas . poiz 6 12 22 For Gold and Workemanship .... 44 18 06 It m One Ampulla or Eglet poiz 21 08 00 For Gold and Workemanship 102 05 00 It m The Anointing Spoon . poiz 3 05 00 For Silver and Workemanship . 2 00 00 It 111 One Chalice and Paten . poiz 61 12 12 For Gold and Workemanship . 277 06 03 £12,050 03 05 G. Talbot.” “ A List of Regalias provided for his late Ma ties Coronation, w ch were delivered for Fees, «fec., by Order, and are out of y e Custody of S r Gilbert Talbot, Kn‘, Master and Treas r of his Maj’ s Jewells and Plate, and are now to be provided, &c. : — OZ. dwt. gr. li. s. d. Imprim s One L d High Constable’s Staffe . poiz 15 00 00 For Silver and Workemanship 08 15 00 It m One Earle Marshall’s Staffe . . . . poiz 9 00 00 For Silver, Gilding, and Workemanship 07 15 00 It m Six Canopy Staves poiz 180 02 12 For Silver and Workemanship . . 76 11 01 It m One Crowne for Garter King at Arms . poiz 24 10 0 For Gold and Workemanship. 116 17 6 It m One Chaine and Jewell . poiz 5 13 3 For Gold and Workemanship 43 06 97 It m One Banner and Rod . poiz 3 13 3 For Golde and Workemanship 14 03 * Proceedings of the Society of Anti- quaries , 1852, vol. ii. , No. 31, p. 222. f The framework of this crown was taken by Messrs. Rundell and Bridge, in part pay- ment for a new crown made by them in 1838, and is now in the possession of W. A, Tyssen-Amherst, Esq., M.P, 36 Old English Plate. [CHAP. II. It m One Collar of SS . . For Silver, Guilding, and Workemanship It™ Six Collars of SS . For Silver and Workemanship It™ Two Coronets For Silver, Gilding, and Workemanship It™ Two Collars of SS . For Silver and Workemanship It m Coronation Meddalls — Twelve For Gold and Workemanship . It 111 Two Ingots For Gold and Workemanship . It™ One Cup .... For Gold and Workemanship It™ Jewells, 75 for Kn ts of the Bath, of w ch seven are in custody poiz 35 10 12 For Gold and Workemanship 433 04 4 £1,067 19 4 G. Talbot.” Interesting as this curious history of the Regalia is in itself, and as showing that none of the old Regalia, not even the Anointing Spoon, survived the Commonwealth, it is not of less importance to note the mode in which these and other documents came into Mr. Cole’s hands. The instructive particulars of his acquisition of them shall be told in his own words. He says : “ It will be in the recollection of the Society that some two or three years ago the then Lords of the Treasury directed the selection and mutilation of many tons weight of Exchequer Records (as they were not improperly called), and which, after being mutilated, were sold as waste paper. It is not necessary for me to make any observations on the propriety or impropriety of this order for the destruction of original documents, nor on the manner in which that order was executed : the report of the committee appointed by the House of Lords to inquire into the subject is before the public, and to that, and the evidence taken on the occasion, I would refer the Society. The contractor with the Government for the purchase of the mutilated records re-sold the mass in various parcels, and a portion of about two tons weight came into my hands, from which I selected many very curious and interesting documents, one of them the subject of my present com- munication.” In view of any similar wholesale destruction of ancient public records in future, the necessity cannot he too strongly urged of examining them far more carefully and by more expert hands than hitherto, be- fore they are altogether condemmed ; and it may help to save some of them to show, by fragments that have accidentally escaped, what chap, if.] The Banker Goldsmiths. 37 curious and interesting historical information may easily be overlooked and destroyed. Returning to the Vyners and the Jenners, it must not he forgotten that from this time until 1700 or even later the London goldsmiths frequently combined the business of hanking with their trade, many of the gentry in those troublous times being glad to adopt the practice of keeping “running cash balances” with their goldsmiths for safety’s sake instead of keeping gold in their own houses. This, indeed, is the origin of modern London banking, and in some cases existing firms actually represent ancestors who came in for their business in this way, and gradually dropped their earlier calling for the new one. Not that the goldsmiths’ craft was thought by any means a despic- able one ; they are found resenting association with men of “ meaner trades,” even as dwellers in the same street, and in the time of Charles I., the influence of the king himself was on occasion exercised for the removal of such people from Cheapside, which was then almost exclusively inhabited by the goldsmiths. An account lately published of Messrs. Childs’ banking house, tells of the apprenticing in early life of the great Sir Francis Child, Lord Mayor in 1699, to his grandfather, William Wheeler the elder, a gold- smith at Temple Bar ; of his marriage with liis cousin Elizabeth Wheeler, the only daughter and heiress of his uncle, William Wheeler the younger, and of his succession to the business, which has ever since been carried on at the sign of the Marigold in the same name. But this brings us a step further towards modern banking, for a list of goldsmiths is given, and it includes Charles Duncomb of the Grasshopper, Francis Kenton of the King’s Arms, Thomas Fowle ol the Black Lion, J. Heriot of the Naked Boy, and John Mawson & Co. of the Golden Hind, all in Fleet Street, and John Coggs of the King’s Head in the Strand, who prior even to 1700 kept accounts with Childs’, instead of carrying on a joint goldsmith’s and banking business for the benefit of their customers, or even taking care of their own money. The same account gives the names of William Rawson and John Marryott in 1666, Thomas Williams of the Crown in 1677, William Pinckney of the Golden Dragon, Irner Temple Gate, in 1663, Joseph Horneby, John Portman, Robert Welsted, and Thomas Rowe, all gold- smiths of more or less note in the time of Charles II., besides the better known one of Edward Backwell, who died in 1679, ruined by his dealings with that sovereign. In a bill drawn upon Atwills’ by Francis Tyssen and accepted by Mr. William Atwill and Company, 23 March, 1703, that well-known banking firm are only called “ Goldsmiths of London.” 38 Old English Plate. [chap. ii. But in the midst of more interesting historical remarks, the work- ing goldsmith and his regulations must not be forgotten ; and so far as these are concerned, we find that things remained where we left them early in the century, till in 1675, for the prevention and redress of great abuses, the Goldsmiths’ Company put forth a notice dated from their Hall on Feb. 23, to the following effect : — That whereas divers small wares were frequently worked and put to sale worse than standard, and also divers pieces of silver plate sold, not being assayed at Goldsmiths’ Hall, and not marked with the leopard’s head crowned, and whereas to prevent such frauds the wardens had formerly required all plate workers and small workers to cause their respective marks to be brought to the said Hall, and struck there in a table kept in the Assay Office, notice was by this order given to all goldsmiths in and about the cities of London and Westminster to repair to the hall, and there strike their marks in a table appointed for that purpose, and likewise enter their names and their dwellings in a book, and that workers and shopkeepers should forbear to sell any gold or silver wares not being agreeable to standard, gold of 22 carats, and silver of 11 oz. 2 dwts. fine, nor before the workman’s mark be struck thereon, and the same assayed at Goldsmiths’ Hall, and there approved for standard by striking thereon the hjon and Leopard's head crowned , or one of them, if the works would conveniently bear the same, and the order concludes with a caution as to the penalty for infringing it. Passing mention must he made of “ the Plate Lotteries ” of Charles II. before going on to a later reign. These seem to have been a con- trivance for rewarding the fidelity of those who had served the crown during the interregnum, and for raising money at the same time for present needs. The mode of distributing gifts of plate from the Crown as prizes by means of lotteries, probably recommended itself by the opportunity it offered of farming out to advantage the right of setting up and bringing out the lotteries in various parts of England, and of selling the tickets. Mr. Hone, speaking of this ingenious mode of increasing the revenue, gives from Malcolm’s Manners a public adver- tisement of the year 1669, as follows* : — “ This is to give notice that any persons who are desirous to farm any of the counties within the kingdom of England or the dominion of Wales, in order to the setting up of a plate lottery, or any other lottery whatsoever, may repair to the lottery office at Mr. Philip’s house in Mermaid Court, over against the mews, where they may contract with the trustees commissioned Hone’s Every Day Book, ii. 1413. CHAP. II.] The Britannia Standard. 39 by His Majesty’s letters patent for tlie management of the said lotteries on the behalf of the truly royal, indigent officers.” We now come to legislation of a different character. The order of 1675 had had its effect, and it became necessary rather to protect the coin of the realm from being melted down for plate, than to insist on the fineness of the plate itself. Large quantities of plate had been sacrificed for King and Parlia- ment, or confiscated by one or the other in this disturbed century, and now that quiet times had come again, the rich turned their attention to replenishing their tables and cupboards with the necessary plate, and even tavern-keepers supplied themselves with silver drinking- vessels. We find the grand jury of Middlesex presenting in 1695 that the frequent and common use of silver basons, monteaths, silver tankards, bowls, cups and tumblers of silver in public houses and taverns have occasioned many burglaries and murders, and praying the Bench to make application to His Majesty’s Council or Parliament or both to find out means to prevent such common use of silver in such places. All classes seem to have resorted to the supply of metal that was nearest at hand — the silver coin of the realm. In consequence, therefore, of this practice of melting down the coin, legislation for its protection became necessary, and in 1696 (8 & 9 Will. III. c. 8) with this object the standard for plate was raised above that of the silver coinage, so as to make the silver of the coin- age less easily available for plate making. It was enacted that on and after March 25, 1697, no worker of plate should make any article of silver less in fineness than 11 oz. 10 dwts. of fine silver in every pound Troy, nor put to sale, exchange or sell any article made after that day but of that standard, nor until it had been marked with the marks now appointed to distinguish plate of this new standard. These marks were to be as follows : — The worker’s mark to be expressed by the two first letters of his surname , the marks of the mystery or craft of the goldsmiths, which instead of the leopard’s head and lion were to be the figure of a lion's head erased and the figure of a woman, commonly called Britannia , and a distinct and variable mark to be used by the warden of the same mystery, to denote the year in which such plate was made. The plate made at this period is often called of “ Britannia standard ” to distinguish it. But here another difficulty arose, for this Act mentioning no pro- vincial offices practically deprived them of the privilege of stamping any plate at all, as they were not empowered to use the marks appointed for the new, and now the only legal, standard. The result of this was that from 1697 until the establishment of certain pro- 40 [CHAP. Hi Old English Plate . vincial offices, as we shall see, in 1701, no plate was properly stamped anywhere but in London, and what little plate was made in the pro- vinces was stamped irregularly.* Leaving, however, the provincial offices for the present, some further provisions of the Act of 1697 must not he forgotten, for it not only protected the coin by raising the standard, but adopted means for in- creasing the supply of it. This was effected by providing for the ready purchase by the mint of any wrought plate bearing the stamps of the Goldsmiths’ Company at 5s. 4c/. per ounce, and such an offer, no doubt, brought about a further destruction of some of the ancient plate that had escaped previous storms. From this time forward, owing to the re-registration of makers’ marks, which now became necessary, considerably more is known about plateworkers’ names than is the case in earlier days. Some of them were artists of great merit, and the names and abodes of all those of much note have been entered against their marks in an appendix at the end of this volume. The best patronised of them will be known by the number of recorded examples of work stamped with their respective marks. In the course of the next twenty years the object of the last- mentioned statute was accomplished, though somewhat slowly, and at length the necessity for its continuance no longer existed. Added to this it seems to have been found that articles made of the higher quality of silver were not so durable nor so serviceable as those of the old standard. Even as late as 1718, silver coin was very uncomfortably scarce,! and this scarcity was one of the principal matters to which the Parlia- ment of that year directed its attention. Lord Stanhope in his official statement as head of the Treasury ascribed it to three causes : first, the increasing luxury in relation to plate, secondly the export of plate or other bullion to the East Indies, and thirdly, to the clandestine trade carried on of exporting silver and importing gold to and from Holland, Germany, and other countries. In 1717 the East India Company had exported three million ounces of silver, which far ex- ceeded the imports, so that large quantities of silver specie must have been melted up to supply the export and the silversmiths. Lord Stanhope also hinted at “ the malice of some persons, who by hoard- ing up silver thought to distress the Government.” However this may be, the “ old sterling” standard was restored with its old marks from June 1, 1720 (6 Geo I., c. 11), and took its place beside the new See p. 88 t Lord Mahon’s History of England, vol. i., p. 443 CHAP. II.] Hall Marks on Gold . 4i or Britannia standard, which, with its own special marks, was left a lawful standard for such as preferred it. Provisions against dishonesty were again found to be necessary, and in 1739, in consequence of great frauds which are detailed in the Act of that year (12 Geo. II., cap. 26), particularly in the use of excessive quantities of solder, the standards were again fixed at 22 carats for gold, and 11 oz. 2 dwts. for silver, though the higher standard was not abolished, and the marks to be used were resettled, the maker’s initials to be those of his Christian name and surname, instead of the first two letters of his surname as was ordered in 1697, likewise the character or alphabet of the initial letters used was to be in each case changed also. The marks to be used by the country assay offices were also dealt with, but, as will be seen in a subsequent chapter, not so clearly as could have been wished.* As before, the general re- registration of marks has stored the books of the Goldsmiths’ Com- pany with a quantity of information as to the names of the goldsmiths of the day. Except for the lower standards of gold, we have now been carried through all the marks to be found on plate stamped in London, save one only — the mark of the sovereign’s head. This was introduced in 1784 (24 Geo. III., c. 53) by an Act granting a duty from December 1 in that year of 8s. per oz. 011 gold plate, and of sixpence per oz. on silver. It directed the wardens or assay master to mark the pieces with a new mark, viz. the king’s head over and above the several marks already used. Some further details as to duties payable, articles exempted, and dealers’ licences will be found under the head of the duty mark in the next chapter. Last of all we come to some quite recent improvements in the system of marking gold, and to the authorization of the above-men- tioned lower gold standards, a step brought about by the use of that precious metal amongst larger classes of society. These provisions are the last on our list relating to marks, and are perhaps the least interesting of all from an antiquary’s point of view, however valuable they may be to the purchaser in the every-day dealings of trade. The lower standards, or rather all those below 18 carats, have never been much used nor appreciated by the public, and it will not be necessary to refer to them at any length. The Act, however, is an important one (38 Geo. III. c. 69), which in 1798 authorized the much-used standard of 18 carats fine for gold, and provided for its being marked See Chap. V., p. 92. 42 Old English Plate. [chap. II. with a crown and the figures 18 instead of the lion passant ; for it had the good effect of giving gold a different distinguishing mark from silver for the first time, a distinction which should have been made long before. It must always be remembered that until 88 Geo. III. there was no special distinguishing mark for gold, and then only for 18-carat gold, and further that it was not until 1844 that 22-carat gold was marked otherwise than as silver would have been. By 7 & 8 Viet. c. 22, s. 15, this last improvement was made, and 22-carat gold has from that time been marked with a crown and 22, instead of the lion passant, to the great advantage of the public. The still lower standards for gold were legalised in 1854 (17 & 18 Viet. c. 96), by a provision enabling Her Majesty in Council to allow any gold standard of not less than one-third of fine gold. In pursu- ance of this, three reduced standards were ordered to he marked as follows, viz. : — 15-carat, with the figures 15 and '625 ; 12-carat, with 12 and '5 ; and 9-carat, with 9 and '875 — the second figure in each case being the proportion of fine gold expressed in decimals. The Act called “the Goldsmiths’ Act” of 1844, which has been already mentioned as regulating the marking of 22-carat gold (7 & 8 Viet. c. 22), also regulates the trade as regards forgeries of dies or marks, the selling of plate worse than standard, and other such frauds. But as this is rather a matter of present-day interest than connected with the history of the craft or their marks, a fuller con- sideration of it is reserved for a separate chapter devoted to frauds and offences. The result of this somewhat long historical and legal notice is that we shall find, on plate made in London, the following marks, or some of them, in accordance with the various statutes and ordinances that have been recounted. Stated for clearness in their chronological order, they are as follows : — 1. The Leopard’s head, from 1300. 2. The Maker’s mark, from 1363. 3. The Annual letter, from 1478. 4. The Lion passant, from 1545. 5. The Lion’s head erased, and figure of Britannia, from 1697. 6. The Sovereign’s head, from 1784. The following chapter treats of each of these marks in turn more fully. * From 1697 — 1720 used instead of the leopard’s head crowned and lion passant, which were discontinued during that interval. Since 1720, used, when required, for plate made of the higher standard silver. Table of the Makes found upon Plate made in London from the Earliest Times. CHAP. II.] Table of London Marks. 43 1854). used on all descrip- tions of plate alike. Ditto, 9-c. (since Ditto. 9 and *375. 1854). CHAPTER III. THE MARKS FOUND ON PLATE ASSAYED IN LONDON— THE LEOPARD’S HEAD — THE MAKER’S MARK — THE DATE-LETTER — THE LION PASSANT — THE LION’S HEAD ERASED AND FIGURE OF BRITANNIA — THE SOVEREIGN’S HEAD. THE LEOPARD’S HEAD. Though, in all probability, workers in the precious metals had been, from even earlier times, in the habit of signing their work each with his own distinguishing symbol, the ancient mark of a leopard’s head appointed by statute in 1300 is the first which is mentioned in any law or ordinance regulating the goldsmith’s art in England. In the translation of the original Norman-French of this enactment, as given in the Statutes at Large, the words used are “ the leopard’s head,” as if it were some known and recognised symbol, but in the original itself the words are “line teste de leopart,” and Mr. Octavius Morgan has suggested that the article “ tine ” implies that it was a new mark invented for the purpose. On the other hand, the first charter of the Goldsmiths’ Company, dated 1327, refers to the mark as ordained “ of ancient times,” and this would seem a somewhat inappropriate description of a mark instituted within living memory. However this may be, from' 1300, if not before, it was, until the introduction of the lion passant, the king’s mark for “gold of a certain touch,” and “ silver of the sterling allay.” And first, some confusion and error seem to have existed with regard to the term “Leopard's head,” it being, in fact, a Lion’s head. It will, however, be remem- bered, that in old French, the language alike of heraldry and of our early statutes, the term “ leopart ” means a lion passant guardant. The arms of England from the time of Henry III. have been three such lions, and in the old French heraldic works they are described as three “ leoparts ” or “ lions leopardies.” The leopard’s head, therefore, is properly the head of a lion passant guardant, which, in fact, is a lion’s front face ; and all the early examples of this mark show a fine bold lion’s face with mane and beard, having on the head a ducal crown. It was in all probability, therefore, taken from the CHAP. TII.] The Leopard's Head ’ 45 arms of the sovereign, and the crown added as a further indication of its being the King’s mark. It is actually called “ the King’s mark ” in the next statute in which it is mentioned, that of 1863. It must here be remarked that although in the Act of 1300, and the charter of 1327, it is only termed “ the leopard's head,” in the earliest Gold- smiths’ ordinances it is spoken of as “ the Liberds liede crowned ,” whilst in the Act of 1477 it is described in both ways : later, in the Goldsmiths’ records of 1597, it appears as the leopard’s head only, though it is certainly and always found bearing a crown, upon plate of that period, and as far back as hall-marked plate is found at all. We may conclude that it was, in truth, crowned from the first, and that it is a mistake arising out of the wording of the Act of 1477, to date the addition of the crown from that year. It is a very doubtful point too whether the mark should be called, as it often is, the London hall-mark. It certainly was not so origi- nally, except in the sense that in early times the Goldsmiths’ Com- pany in that city were the only authorised keepers of “ the king’s touch.” In 1477 it was not considered specially a London mark, for the Act of that year, speaking of the prevalent abuse of setting this mark on gold and silver that was not fine, recites as a grievance that the “ said touch of the Leopard’s head is oftentimes put on such things by the keeper of the said touch of London and other places.” Here the “ said touch of the Leopard’s head ” is recognised as the sign of the standard, used as well in London as elsewhere. Again, when it was abolished for a time (1697-1720), together with the lion passant, in favour of two new marks, those two new marks were both used under the Acts which, shortly afterwards, established the pro- vincial assay offices ; neither of them was reserved specially for the Goldsmiths’ Company, as would have been the case if its own peculiar hall-mark had been abolished, and the inference is irresistible that at that time it was considered a national standard mark and not the London hall-mark at all. Further, upon the restoration of the old sterling standard of silver in 1720, the leopard’s head crowned was resumed in ordinary course by several of the provincial offices, for metal of that degree of fineness, and in one such office, viz., New- castle-upon-Tyne, it is used at the present day. It should also be noted that even when the leopard’s head and the lion passant were disused on silver, they still remained in force for standard gold, and it may favour the view of the leopard’s head being a standard mark rather than the distinguishing mark of the London Goldsmiths’ Hall, that it was used at this time on one metal assayed there, but not on the other. 46 Old English Plate . [chap. III. Like the question of the derivation of the mark, this point is, how- ever, rather of antiquarian interest than of practical importance, for even if it were the standard mark until the invention of the lion passant practically released it, if we may say so, from doing duty in that capacity, it may perhaps not unfairly since that date, say from 1545, when found on London-made plate, be looked upon as answer- ing the same purpose as the shields of arms used as their distinguish- ing hall-marks by assay-offices in the provinces. When we come to consider the London date letter, we shall urge its claim to be the London mark properly so called. In conclusion, although evidently not always confined to London, the leopard’s head crowned has been used at Goldsmiths’ Hall for what- ever purpose from time immemorial on standard gold, and on old sterling silver whenever such silver has been worked. The appearance of the stamp has from time to time been altered, and always for the worse. The size of the lion’s head was somewhat diminished in the year 1729, when he w r as also shorn of much of his mane and beard, the character of the crown being also altered ; and in or about 1822, from the fact, it is believed, of the mention of a simple “ leopard’s head” being found in some of the earlier documents and especially in the Act 12 Geo. II. c. 26, without being followed by the w T ord “ crowned,” the form of the stamp was altogether changed, and the head deprived of its crown, was made to present an object far more resembling the head of a cat than the fine bold face of former days, which we would fain see restored to its pristine form. The wording of 12 Geo. II. c. 26 in this particular was no doubt somewhat; a matter of chance ; but however this may be, it deserves to be remarked, that in and after 1824-5, but for the omission of the crown, it would be somewhat difficult to distinguish the small Roman letters then current from those of the former small Roman alphabet of 1776-1795. Until then the letters would be sufficiently distinguished by the fact that the earlier alphabet, down to the “ i ” of 1784, would be unaccompanied by a king’s head mark ; but this distinction ceasing with that letter in 1784, there would for the rest of the cycle be nothing but a slight difference in the royal portrait to depend upon, were it not for the absence of the crown from the leopard’s head. This consideration seems however to have had nothing to do with the innovation, which accidentally proves so useful. CHAP. III.] 7 he Makers Mark. 47 THE WORKER’S OR MAKER’S MARK. The next tiling to be considered in the chronological series is the maker’s mark. Following closely, as we have seen, on its adoption in other countries, such a mark was first instituted in England by statute in 1868, when it was directed that every master goldsmith should have a mark of his own, known by those who should be ap- pointed by the king to survey the works; which marks, for which the goldsmiths should answer, should be set on the works after they had been assayed. The Goldsmiths’ Company made similar pro- visions in their earliest known ordinances, to that which now became the law of the land ; and almost every subsequent statute provides, under heavy penalties, for the marking of plate with the mark or sign of the worker. These marks were at first, in many cases, emblems or symbols ; probably often selected in allusion to the name of the maker. In early times most shops had signs by which they were known, and some retain the custom even to the present day, especially on the Continent. This no doubt arose from the fact that, as few persons could read, the writing of the name would be of little use, whereas the setting up of some sign, such for instance as the golden ball, which was easily understood, gave a convenient name to the shop ; it is therefore not improbable that the goldsmiths, in some cases, took for their mark the sign of their shop. Several of the old goldsmiths' signs are well known, as, for instance, the “grasshopper” of Sir Thomas Gresham’s house in Lombard Street, now occupied by Messrs. Martins, and the “marigold” which a century later distinguished the house where the Childs carried on their banker-goldsmith business in Fleet Street. The squirrel, too, which we find on plate of 1599 (see Appendix A.), may remind us of the three squirrels still to be seen on the front of Messrs. Goslings’ banking-house also in Fleet Street. The Golden Bottle has always been the distinguishing sign of Messrs. Hoares’ bank, now in the same thoroughfare, but formerly in Clieapside. Neither are there wanting notices here and there of the signs of more obscure working- goldsmiths, especially in the accounts of parish churchwardens in the reigns of Edward YI. and Queen Elizabeth. In accounts of 1551, one Calton is found working at the sign of “ the Purse in Chepe,” and a fellow craftsman of the name of Wark at “ the George in Lomberde Strete ; ” another account of 1560 mentions a “ Mr. Muscliamp, goldsmith of London,” as of “ the Ryng with the Bube,” also in “ Lumbarde St.” A spoon of 1525 has the figure of a heart 48 Old English Plate. [CHAP. III. n stamped thus as the maker’s mark, and many early specimens have similar symbols. Some few marks of the earlier goldsmiths resemble those so well known as merchants’ marks, or the masons’ marks on ancient buildings ; see for example what seems to have been the trade mark of Robert Harding, alderman and gold- smith, who died in 1503, having served as master of the Goldsmiths’ Company in 1489. An engraving of this is given in the margin.* Another somewhat simpler, viz. is found on a small cup of 1599, in the possession of the Armourers’ Company. It has, however, been previously remarked how very seldom the shop sign of a maker is reproduced in his mark. Some half-dozen pieces of plate alone in the early Elizabethan period, and those somewhat doubtfully, are all that can be attributed to their proper maker by the mark they bear. The fleur cle lys found on plate of 1562 may possibly'belong to William Dyxson living at “ the Fleur de Luce in Chepe.” in 1569 ; the leg of 1550 to William Beereblocke, of “ the Legge in Chepe,” also of 1569 ; Robert Wright, of “ the Wynd- mylle,” in 1569, may have made a cup bearing that symbol in 1578 ; the covered cup found in 1548 and 1561, may be the mark of John Mabbe, of “ the Cup in Chepe,” in 1569 ; Thomas Bampton, of “ the Falcon,” also in 1569, may have made plates bearing that mark in 1567. John Harysson, in 1569, of “ the Broad Arrow,” may have made the Tokerys Bowl in 1534. Sometimes initial letters were used as the workers’ marks, and eventually they became the rule ; indeed symbols and emblems un- accompanied by any initial letters hardly ever occur later than the commencement of the seventeenth century. The examination of a o-reat number of specimens of that century has given us less than half a dozen such marks ; a water-bird in a dotted circle, found on an example belonging to the Hon. Society of the Middle Temple of the year 1682-3, being the very last, and except that single one, there is nothing of the kind later than 1661, when the Communion-plate at Gloucester Cathedral is found to bear some animal or other not easily to be recognized, on a shaped shield. The anonymous author of the Touchstone for Gold and Silver Wares, writing in 1675, makes the following remarks as to the supervision exercised by the Goldsmiths’ Company over the makers’ marks: — “In this office” (referring to the Assay-Office at Gold- smiths’ Hall) “ is likewise kept for publique view a table or tables artificially made of columns of parchment or velom, and several of * Surrey A rchceoloyical Society’s Transactions, vol, vi., part i., p. 36. CHAP. III.] The Maker s Mark . 49 the same sorts ; in the lead columns are struck or entered the workers’ marks ( which are generally the first two letters of tlieiv Christian and surnames), and right against them, in the parchment or velom columns, are writ and entered the owners’ names ; This is that which is meant in the before-recited statutes, by the expression of making the workers' mark known to the surveyors or wardens of the craft; which said warden’s duty is to see that the marks be plain and of a fit size, and not one like another , and to require the thus entering the said marks, and also the setting them clear and visible on all gold and silver work, not only on every work, hut also on every part thereof that is wrought apart and afterwards soldered or made fast thereto in finishing the same. Our law-makers (as I conceive) did think the thus setting the marks on the work, to be the securest way to prevent fraud in this kind ; for if it would not deter from the working and selling coarse silver and gold wares, yet would it be a sure way to find out the offenders and to have the injured righted. But if the marks might be omitted, and the works should pass but into a third owner’s hand, for the most part it would be impossible to discern one man’s work from another, by reason that divers workers make all sorts of work in shape so near alike.” Much of the information once possessed by the Goldsmiths’ Company as to workers’ names or their places of abode down to the year 1697, is unfortunately lost, together with those tables, and it is only by the examination of ancient inventories and accounts that here and there a name can be put to a mark ; as, for instance, when the accounts of churchwardens give the name of the goldsmith from whom com- munion-plate was purchased, and it chances that their successors in office are still in possession of the article so procured. The only official record now in existence of any of their marks prior to that date, is a copper-plate, preserved in the Assay-Master’s Office, carefully framed and glazed to save it from further harm, which contains a number of impressions in nine parallel columns from the punches used by the makers who were working between 1675 and 1697. This plate bears the following inscription, viz. : — “ On the above Plate are the Marks from Workmen taken at this Office Prior to the Fifteenth of April, a.d. 1697, of which not any other Entry is to be found.” It was at one time thought possible that it contained the marks of workers for generations past, and its importance in that case could hardly have been over-rated : but it is now clear that it owes what interest it has to being the identical table referred to in the Goldsmiths’ Order of 1675 (see p. 38). Almost every maker’s mark found on plate from 1675 to 1697 is registered thereon, but none of 5° [ciiAr. nr. Old English Plate . any other period. The hook referred to in the same Order as appointed for the entry of names, has perished with the earlier tables ; and this one remaining table, interesting as it is as a relic, is therefore but a bare record of certain marks used for those few years only, without any names against them. It cannot he said to possess the value, and is not of the interest, that would attach to a portion of an unbroken series, hut all the more important marks upon it will he found in the list of examples given later. From 1697 onwards, impressions of the marks from the makers’ own punches have been taken regularly, and are preserved in volumes with the owners’ names and addresses, apparently in their own handwriting, entered against their respective marks. In that year, it will he remembered, we came at last to an express enactment that the worker’s mark should be the first tiro letters of his surname , and this must have caused a general change of marks throughout the trade, indeed we can trace it in certain instances ; for example, we may safely assume that the mark of P’H under a crown and two ermine spots found on the copper plate, was the earlier mark of the Peeter Harracke who entered his new one of HA with the same accessories in compliance with this Act in the month of October, 1698. The first letters of the surname were alone used as long as the use of the higher standard of silver was compulsory, that is to say, from 1697 until 1720 ; but on the restoration of the old sterling standard in 1720, makers seem to have thought themselves at liberty to use their ordinary initials, at all events, on wares of the restored standard; and from that year till 1789, their practice was somewhat uncertain, for initials are often found in that interval which could by no possibility have been the first two letters of any surname whatever. Many makers had two marks, one for each standard ; thus Paul Crespin signs his work of the Britannia standard with CR, but old sterling silver with PC ; Isaac Callard with CA and IC respectively, and so on. This want of uniformity was effectually remedied for the future by the Act of 1789, which came into operation on May 28tli, and ordered the makers to destroy their existing marks, and to substitute for them the initials of their Christian and surnames , directing, in addition, that the new letters should, in each case, be of a different character or alphabet from those used before. This was no doubt to further secure the destruction of the old punches. The marks of that celebrated silversmith Paul Lamerie illustrate this course of things throughout. His first registered mark in 1712 was LA ; his second in 1788 P’L ; his third being, in accordance with CHAP. ITT.] The Date Letter. 5i the provisions of 1729, in what maybe termed script letters, registered in the month of June in that year. The initial letters of the Christian and surname have been used from 1739 to the present time. Watch-case makers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries seldom used an escutcheon ; their initials are merely stamped in without any accessories, except perhaps a crown. It only remains to note that the minute mark often found beside the maker’s is a workshop mark to show which particular work- man was employed upon the article bearing it. THE ANNUAL LETTER; ASSAYER’S OR WARDEN’S MARK. This is perhaps the most interesting of all the marks, for it goes far to enable us to ascertain the precise year in which any piece of plate was made. It may seem somewhat of a paradox to begin by stating that it is by no means certain when it was itself introduced. This is nevertheless strictly true. If nothing is better ascertained than that the mark must have been in use from the later part of the fifteenth century, it will scarcely be believed that there is no positive mention of it till 1597, when at last it occurs in the Attorney General’s information, in which it is styled “ The alphabetical mark approved by ordinance amongst the goldsmiths : ” and no one has been able to discover the ordinance by which it was appointed, nor any earlier notice of it by name, although the mark itself is plain enough upon plate of generations before that time. Those who would claim for it the highest degree of antiquity depend upon a supposed mention in 1336 of a “ sayer’s ” mark in addition to the maker’s mark and the leopard’s head crowned in a goldsmith’s ordinance. No such ordinance is to be found amongst those preserved at Goldsmiths’ Hall, the very earliest of which profess themselves to be in accordance “ with the acts of diverse Parliaments,” and cannot therefore be nearly so early as that year. It is, however, pretty clear how the mistake arose. Mr. Herbert, in his history of the Goldsmiths’ Company, * gives a summary of the provisions contained in their “ ancient ordinances,” in the course of which all three marks, including a sayer’s mark, and also the “ assayer’s book,” are mentioned, but without any dates. His paragraph proceeds as follows : — “ The entries as to the assay just given show the practice to have * Herbert’s History of the Livery Companies , vol. ii., 175. 52 [chap. iti. Old English Plate. been very early exercised by the company, in addition to the notice of William Speron in 1886 (now five hundred years ago), we find it ordained in 1366 by general assent that none of the fraternity shall go to fairs, to trade, without having all the goods of the mystery [gold- smith’s work] first assayed before the wardens for the year ; and, in 1444, a member is fined 65 . 8 d. ‘ for withstondyng the wardens in taking of assaie.’ ” On an earlier page Mr. Herbert had given some extracts from the accounts of the company, and amongst them the following entry of the year 1336 of Edward III., “ Argent bailie, a William Speron, des am r ciam t s cest assaie vi s viij eld It is probable that by connecting without any good reason the year mentioned in one sentence with the ordinances referred to in another, a date which referred only to an early mention of the assay itself, has been sometimes attributed to an annual letter as an assayer’s mark. There seems no ground for attaching William Speron’s date to any part of Mr. Herbert’s summary of the ordinances. That summary is an accurate one of all the successive ordinances taken together, but if the originals are examined in detail it will be seen that whilst in the earlier of the ordinances the assayer’s mark was the leopard’s head, in those of 1507 and of 1513 another assayer’s mark is mentioned for the first time. It will be remembered also that in the ancient Acts of 1363 and 1423 the mark to be fixed by the surveyor, “ gardien,” or warden, is always described as the king’s mark, or leopard’s head ; and although all the marks to be used are described in detail in these enactments, no mention whatever is to be found of any mark besides that leopard’s head mark and the mark of the maker. The terms “ assayer ” and “warden” refer to one and the same officer, for the assay was then conducted by the wardens, or “ their deputy, the assayer ordained thereto,” to quote from one of the ordinances. A more moderate, but probably still too high, antiquity was assigned to it by Mr. Octavius Morgan, who, thinking that with certain excep- tions he had been able to obtain examples of all the various alphabets used from 1438 but none earlier, came to the conclusion, for the reasons we are about to quote, that that date was the period of the first adoption of the annual letter. It has already been seen from the proceedings of the Montpellier goldsmiths that, in consequence of repeated and increased frauds, new securities were invented from time to time to provide against them, till at last, in the year 1427, it was ordained as a fresh security that, in order to insure the fineness of the articles assayed after that time, CHAP. III.]' The Date Letter . 55 the name of the warden of the mystery inscribed on the register of the city should be followed by one of the letters of the alphabet, which letter should be reproduced beneath the arms of the town on the piece of plate, in order that it might be known under what warden it was- made, so that in effect he might be held answerable for having made a fraudulent assay, and suffered bad silver to be sold as good standard. The fact of the Montpellier ordinances giving the specific reason for the introduction of a new mark seems very like the origin of it, and it led Mr. Morgan to attribute the first invention and adoption of this mark to the authorities of Montpellier in 1427. When once adopted in one place, it probably soon became a custom in others as an improved security against fraud, and the date of the first alphabet of the English use of which Mr. Morgan thought any trace is to be found, commencing as it does in 1438, very well agreed with the supposition of that being the period of its first introduction into this country. Further than this, he observed the curious coincidence that the first Act rendering the wardens responsible for abuses committed during their respective periods of office is that of 1423, which provides that “if it may be found that the keeper of the touch touch any such harness with the leopard’s head except it be as fine in allay as the sterling, that then the keeper of the touch for everything so proved not as good in allay as the said sterling, shall forfeit the double value to the king and the party.” What more probable than that here, as in France, the want of some means of fixing the right offender in each case with the responsibility for his default was soon felt, and that the Goldsmiths’ Company in 1438 adopted the practice that had ten years before commended itself to their brethren of Montpellier ? So much for 1438. It now seems, with some hesitation be it said, a safer conclusion that the real date of the introducing of a date-letter into their system of hall-marking by the London goldsmiths was 1478. Mr. Morgan was certainly right in considering that the object of our annual date-letter was the same as in the case of Montpellier. The statute of Elizabeth in 1576 again asserts the liability of the wardens, ordaining that if any article shall be touched for good by the wardens, and there shall afterwards be found fraud or deceit therein, the warden shall pay forfeit the value of the thing so marked; and at last in 1679 the author of the Touchstone, writing of the date-letter, says plainly, “ The reason for changing thereof is (as I conceive), for that by the aforesaid recited statutes, it is provided that if any silver work that is worse than sterling be marked with the Company’s marks, the 54 [CHAP. III. Old English Plate. wardens and corporation for the time being shall make recompence to the party grieved, so that if any such default shall happen, they can tell by the letter on the work in what year it was assayed and marked, and thereby know which of their own officers deceived them, and from them obtain over a recompence.” If it is true that the wardens were made responsible in 1428, it is much more to the purpose that in the Act of 1477 the craft was made answerable for the non-sufficiency of the warden. It then became an immensely more important thing for the company to be able to know, in the words of the Touchstone , “which of their own officers deceived them, and from them obtain over a recompence.” This would not perhaps in itself be conclusive, hut there is the further fact that though in 1478 a date-letter was certainly used, no mention of it is found in the important Act of the preceding year, which says much about both the other marks, viz., the leopard’s head crowned and the maker’sTnark, and, as above mentioned, makes the company responsible for its warden. It seems very unlikely that the date-letter would have escaped mention here, had such a mark been in use ; but it seems very likely indeed that the company would then and there institute one. Had it been in existence already, the only way of accounting for its not being mentioned in 1477 would be that the warden’s mark not being one ordered by Parliament, hut only a domestic arrangement of the Gold- smiths’ Company, did not obtain recognition by the legislature in the same manner as the leopard’s head and the marker’s mark. This is, however, at best rather a far-fetched explanation, especially as in later days the variable mark is mentioned in Acts of Parliament. It would certainly be referred to in some of the goldsmiths’ own ordinances within a certain time of its introduction, and, so far from being mentioned soon after 1488, it is not till 1507 that any notice of it occurs. In ordinances of 1507 and 1518, as we shall remember, an assayer’s mark, in addition to the leopard’s head and the maker’s mark, is spoken of; and as the date-letter was then not only in use, but the only mark used except the two others just mentioned, it was clearly the assayer’s mark referred to. If this is so, we can carry back mention of a date-letter from 1597 to 1507, or within a very few years of 1478. The great book of Ordinances and Statutes of the Gold- smiths’ Company was itself commenced in the year 1478 ; and every- thing seems to show that it was a point of fresh departure for the craft. Further than this, there is but one single piece of marked plate in existence, to which there has ever been positively attributed a date earlier than 1478. This is the Pudsey spoon, which has been supposed CHAP. HI.] The Date Letter : 55 upon certain historical evidence to belong to the year 1445. Its marks, however, upon careful examination cannot be distinguished from those of 1525, the spoon may have at some time or other been accidently changed for another in the absence of any inscription or other means of preserving its identity, and it is on the whole much more probable that something of this kind has happened, than that two cycles of date-letters, for which no other evidence exists, should have run their unknown course before the date at which so many circum- stances concur in indicating that a date-letter was introduced. In the following pages and tables the year 1478 is, for all these reasons, given as the commencement of the London series of alphabets. It is only fair to say that some consider England to have given the lead to France in these matters. A distinguished writer * remarks that, to judge by dates, “ the change from makers’ marks alone to guild marks preceded in England, by more than half a century, the same change in France and he cites a letter of Charles V., written in 1376, which seems to speak of a maker’s mark only, as follows : — “ Quelconques orfevres ne porront tenir ne lever forge ne ouvrcr en chambre secrete se ilz ne sont approuvez dcvant les maistres clu mesticr et estre temoigner souffisament de tenir forge et d’ avoir poingon a con - tresaign et autrement non” This hardly, however, precludes the possibility of there being other marks also in use at the same time, and the wording seems taken from earlier statutes, in which the touch of Paris is ordained as a standard, as, for instance, those of King John of France in 1355, which again are themselves only letters of confirmation of still more ancient regulations, taking us back as far as 1260. The parallel passage from King John’s letter of confirmation provides that he who wishes to be a goldsmith of Paris must either be apprenticed, “ on qiCil soit tel eprouve par les maistres et bonnes gens du mestier estre souffisant estre orfevre et de tenir et lever forge et d’ avoir poingon a contreseing ; ” but a later clause adds that, “ mil orfevre ne pent ouvrer d'or a Paris qu'il ne soit a la touche de Paris, on meilleur la quelle touclie passe tons les ors dont Von euvre en mille ter res.” It must have been long a celebrated touch to be spoken of in such terms, and it is clear that in 1300 the lily was well known and recognised even here in England as the Paris mark ; t add to this that Philip le Hardi had ordained in 1275 that each city should have a * Quarterly . 'Review , April, 1876. t Wardrobe accounts of that year, 28 Edward I. (see p. 18). 56 Old English Plate. [CHAP. III. particular mark for works of silver. In all these cases the word “ touch ” must be taken to refer to the mark by which the quality of the metal is certified as well as to that quality itself. It is so used in our own early statutes, in which the phrases “touched with the touch,” “bearing the touch,” “touched with the leopard’s head,” occur as well as another set of expressions in which it is used rather to denote the standard of the metal, for instance, “ gold of a certain touch.” Two “ cliargeours de touche London,” are mentioned in the inventory of the goods of Kichard de Ravenser, Archdeacon of Lincoln, who died in 1386; a quart pot of silver with the “touche of Parys,” and also dishes of silver of “London makyng” occur in a will of 1443;* “ spones marked with the touche of London ” in a will proved in the Canterbury Prerogative Court in 1463; “peciam dez markes Fran- cise,” in 1481 ; and “ spones having the toche of the goldesmyths ” in another will of 1522. The foregoing remarks, it will be observed, deal with the comparative antiquity of the leopard’s head and the lily quite as much as with the English and French date letters ; indeed they apply to either pair of marks alike, and have only found a place here rather than earlier, because they followed naturally upon a comparison of the periods at which the guilds of London and Montpellier respectively adopted a warden’s mark. Some might say, as we have seen, that neither the leopard’s head nor the lily is a guild mark properly so called, but rather the mark of the royal or national standard, each for its own country ; and in the case of England, everything points to the date letter as the only special mark of the London guild. It is the date letter which is described in 1597 as the mark approved by ordinance amongst the goldsmiths themselves, whereas the two other marks then used are “Her Majesty’s ” and “ appointed by statute ” respectively. It would be somewhat of an anomaly to find that of all places in the world, London should have been the one without a peculiar mark of its own, other than its date letter, if it were not that in times when the Goldsmiths’ Company was the only keeper of the national touch, that touch might so easily come to be regarded in practice almost as much the mark of the guild as of the standard. It is a point of no practical importance, at all events since the appointment of a special mark for each provincial assay office ; but to be strictly accurate, we should have to say that London plate is distinguished by the absence of any * Test. Ebor.< see p. 200. CHAP. III.] The Date Letter. 57 provincial mark rather than by the presence of any special mark of its own, unless we admit the claim of its peculiar series of date letters to that character. These it has undeniably used from 1478, in the form of a succession of alphabets, each consisting of twenty letters ; J, U or Y, W, X, Y and Z, being the letters omitted. From 1560-1 they have, with hardly any exception, been enclosed in regular heraldic shields of various shapes, hut till then the letters are surrounded with a line more or less closely following their own outline ; the ends of the punches having been originally of the shape of the letters they bore, and afterwards of a shield shape, with the letter sunk in the centre of the shield. The most notable exceptions to this rule are the letters L of 1726-7, and M of the following year, which are often, if not always, found on a square punch.* From 1678, if not earlier, more than one size of punch is found to have been used, large and small articles having been stamped with marks of different sizes, the smaller ones being often on plain square punches with the corners slightly cut off, instead of in more heraldic shields. Very small letters indeed are found towards the end of the seventeenth century in the inside of watch-cases. In certain years also the letters on the punches in use differ a little in form from one another. Two forms of the letter for 1619-20 occur; and the differences to be noted at 1567-8, 1575-6, and at 1658-9 are also so marked as to require representation in the tables. The introduction of a shield in 1560-1, in the middle of an alphabet be it noted, curiously enough coincides exactly with the restoration of the old sterling standard silver by Queen Elizabeth, which has been spoken of in the preceding chapter ; and the probability that an event of such importance to the Goldsmiths’ Company was marked by them in this or some other particular way suggested a careful examination of the journals of the Company, which resulted in the discovery of the following minute for 16 December, 1560 : — “Also forasmuch as Mr. Wardens and the Assistants have found that the moneys of our sovereign Lady the Quene conteyne in fynesse (xi oz.) eleven ounces and upward therefore it is by them agreed that after the feast of the Epiphaine of our Lord God next comynge the assaymaster and wardens of this companie shall touch no plate under the fynesse of (xi oz. ii dwt) eleven ounces two pennie weight and for a certe knowledge to be had betwene the same plate and other before touched it is agreed that the letter of the yeare shall be grayved round about for a difference.” This positive proof of the reason for the shield lends additional weight to the suggestion which is to be made when the lion passant * No doubt the punch in these cases is of the second size. 5 § Old English Plate. [chap. hi. comes under notice, that its invention in 1545 marks the divergence of the standard of the silver coinage from that of silver plate which then took place. It would be very odd if the degradation of the coinage from the sterling quality maintained throughout for plate, and its subsequent restoration to that standard of purity, were events of two years, in each of which is found to occur a novel feature in the system of hall-marking practised by the Goldsmiths’ Company, and if one of the alterations in the marks, hut not the other, were connected with the coincident changes of the standard. The fleur-de-lys and pellets which accompany in some instances the letter for 1575 no doubt relate to the Act of that year, as in later days the Act of 1739- 49 is marked by the adoption of a new shape of shield for the rest of the letters of the then current alphabet. The variation noted for 1658 is merely due to the use of a damaged punch, probably towards the end of the year ; hut the pellet under the letter for 1567, and the two forms of letter found in 1619 are happily accounted for. In 1567 it appears from the Minute Books of the Court of the Goldsmiths’ Company that a long-standing dispute with the Assay Master Richard Rogers came to a head. The Company required him to give up his house in Chepe and to come and dwell in the proper apartments for the Assay Master at the Hall, as early as in August, 1566. From that time forward there are constant entries of his delays and excuses until at last in Aug. 1567 he promised to come in to the Hall or yield up his office next quarter-day. It was then found necessary to come to close quarters, and ten days more were given him on Nov. 3, 1567 to make up his mind in. The next entry relating to the matter records that on Dec. 24, he was “ discharged of the office of assayer.” Thomas Keelynge was appointed to he his successor ; and on commencing work he no doubt adopted the annulet under the date-letter for the remaining portion of the year. So too in 1619 the second form of the letters is accounted for by the death of the assayer Thomas Dymock in the month of September, and the appointment a month later of John Reynolds. The letters have been annually changed on the day of election of the new wardens, that being St. Dunstan’s Hay prior to the Restora- tion ; the new punches were accordingly handed to the assay- warden for use, on or about May 19th in each year, and were continued to the same time in the year following. Since 1660 the new punches have been first used on the morning of May 30tli, the new wardens having been elected the day before. No entry is found of the letter for the year in the goldsmiths’ journals, until the occurrence of some dispute with the officers of the CHAP. III.] The Date Letter . 59 assay, after which the letters were mentioned. Their earliest note is of the letter for 1629, but from that time the notices are sufficiently regular to indicate the character of all the alphabets. For the earlier letters, it was only by the examination of a great many pieces of ancient plate, chiefly belonging to public companies, colleges, corpora- tions, and churches, of which the histories are known, that Mr. Octavius Morgan was able to collect the information necessary to enable him to construct a table of the alphabets used. The difficulty was increased by the obvious fact that the dates which are engraved on ancient plate cannot always be relied on for the date of the work. Oftentimes pieces of plate which individuals or their families have had in their possession for many years, have afterwards been given or bequeathed by them to public bodies, and then the date of the gift is recorded in the inscription, which will not agree with the period of the work. Again, plate given to public bodies, having been worn out, has been re-made at subsequent periods, or exchanged for more useful articles, and the original date has been engraved on the new-made piece. As an illustration of this difficulty, one of the loving cups of the Goldsmiths’ Company itself goes by the name of “ Hanbury’s Cup,” and bears engraved on it the record of its having been the gift of Bichard Hanbury in 1608. The form and workmanship of the cup are clearly of the period of Charles II., and that was confirmed by the annual letter. In searching the books of the Company, Mr. Morgan found by accident a memorandum stating that “ Hanbury’s cup, weight 60 oz., was sold with other plate in 1687, and re-made in 1666.” This latter date agrees precisely with the annual letter it bears. The present writer’s experiences on this point are the same. He was somewhat surprised to find, when examining the plate of the Salters’ Company, that though bearing the arms and dates of Sir Nicholas Crispe, Knt. and Bart., and other great salters of the reign of Charles I. and Charles II., it all seemed made in 1716 by a well- known goldsmith named Humphrey Payne. At last a Monteith dated 1660 appeared. This was too much of an anachronism ; and a refer- ence to the old books of the Company being kindly permitted, some curious facts, which had been entirely lost sight of and forgotten, came to light. It appeared that the Company had resolved, in 1711, to sell all their plate, after carefully registering the weights of the articles, and also the dates, names, and arms of the donors which might be engraved upon them, in order to invest the proceeds in lottery tickets (it will be remembered that State lotteries were then just a new thing, having been first authorized by Parliament in 1709). It further appeared that in 1716, it was determined to replace the 6o [CHAP. III. Old English Plate. plate, the lottery tickets were sold, tenders by London goldsmiths were invited ; and the tender of Humphrey Payne and Co., which was the lowest of three sent in, being accepted, new plate of the same weight, but not in articles of the same description, as that sold in 1711, was made by him for the Company; and it was ordered that the names, arms, and dates of the donors of the old plate should be placed upon the new. Humphrey Payne’s receipt “for self and Co.,” is extant amongst the minutes of the year 1716. In this way were gradually put together the alphabets published in 1853 by Mr. Octavius Morgan, who succeeded in ascertaining the forms of no less than sixty-five letters previously unknown, including specimens of every alphabet as far back as 1478. To these many more have now been added, and some of the occasional gaps later than 1629, which existed in the original tables, filled up. Some time after their publication by Mr. Morgan, these alphabets were reproduced with the addition of shields, by Mr. W. Chaffers, who seems to have adopted Mr. Morgan’s tables and data ; but some of the letters, and the shields in many cases, were incorrect, and a some- what doubtful improvement upon the original tables thus laboriously compiled. The cycles of twenty years seem to have proceeded regularly from 1478 to 1696, when, on the occasion of the new standard being introduced and new marks appointed for it, a fresh alphabet was com- menced. The entries in the Goldsmiths’ minutes are as follows : — “ a.d. 1696, May 29th. — New puncheons received ; the letter for the year being t in a scutcheon “ a.d. 1697, March 27tli. — The puncheons for the remaining part of this year were received, being according to an Act of Parliament, a Lyon’s head erased, a Britannia, and for the letter the great court ft in an escutcheon It must be borne in mind that as the new letters were not fixed till May 29th, each letter served for a portion of two years, even in days before the change of style. This t and ft, therefore, between them, served as the letters for the goldsmiths’ year 1696-7, that is, for the year beginning May 30tli, 1696 ; the court-hand letter for 1697-8 coming into use on May 30th, 1697. Some instances of a small black letter tt for the year 1697-8 are said to exist ; and if so, no doubt it is upon certain articles made, but not marked or sold, previous to the adoption of the new standard. It would have been very hard on those who had expended time and CHAP. HI.] The Lion Passant. 61 skill upon old sterling silver in the year 1696-7, with no notice of the impending alteration in the standard, if such wares had been thereby rendered unsaleable. The act was, however, so worded as to avoid doing this injustice, and such articles would be stamped with the old marks, including the tt that would have denoted 1697-8 in ordinary course. The new court-hand alphabet was applicable only to plate of the new standard inaugurated with it. New and carefully constructed tables of the alphabets, and their shields or other inclosures, are given at the end of this volume. THE LION PASSANT. There is no mark better known and none less understood than the lion passant. Far from being the ancient sign of sterling silver, it is not found at all until the middle of the sixteenth century. The most careful enquiry has failed to produce an earlier instance than one of the year 1545, and it is not mentioned in any statute, ordinance, or other proceeding until the indictment by the Attorney- General in 1597, in which it is called Her Majesty s Lion , whilst the other two marks are described respectively as “ the leopard’s head limited by statute ,” and “ the alphabetical mark approved by ordinance amongst themselves ” (i.e., the Goldsmiths’ Company). In earlier days the leopard’s head was the king’s mark ; does the lion passant now take its place ? Its origin, intention, and even the precise date of its introduction are all equally obscure. It is never found before 1543, nor is it ever absent after 1545 ; hut there is no article of plate known to exist of the intervening year. In one or the other of the years 1544 and 1545 it must have been introduced. Its description in 1597 would imply that it had been appointed to be used by some royal order, but the Kegisters of the Privy Council and the records of the Goldsmiths’ Company have alike been searched in vain ; there is no mention of it in the latter, and the volume of the former for just this period is almost the only one of a long series that is missing. We are therefore thrown back upon a conjecture, but one which there seems good ground for adopting. It will be remembered that it was in 1542 that the fineness of the silver coin of the realm was, for the first time since the Conquest, lowered ; not that the pound sterling of silver had not been lessened in value several times in that long period, but it had always been effected by diminishing its weight, leaving the fineness of the silver unaltered. In 1542, however, Henry VIII. not only diminished the 62 Old English Plate. [CHAP. III. weight but reduced the standard from 11 ounces 2 dwts. fine to 10 ounces fine, and again in 1544 from 10 ounces to 6 ounces, leaving but 6 ounces of fine silver in a troy pound, this being followed by a further and final degradation in 1545. It will also be remembered that the touch of the leopard’s bead crowned certified only that the silver was “of the alloy of the sterling or better.” What security then would the buyer have bad after 1542 that plate bought by him was of any better silver than the debased coinage of the day ? None whatever. May we not, therefore, hazard a conjecture that the lion passant was adopted at about this period to show that plate bearing it was not only as good as the coin, but was of the old sterling standard ? No later writer has attempted to penetrate the mystery since Mr. Octavius Morgan first drew attention to it, and the Quarterly Reviewer, in 1876, who may be taken to sum up modern learning on the point, does so in a wish that “ some of those laborious gentlemen who are engaged in calendering the State Papers, may fall, in the course of their researches, on some Order in Council or Gracious Proclamation enjoining the addition of this royal lion — for it at least came out of the coat-armour of the sovereign — to the three marks rendered imperative by statute.” From 1545 the lion passant, or more properly lion passant guardant, has invariably been found upon silver of the old sterling, and until 1844 upon standard gold ; and, whilst it must be confessed that this theory does not account for its appearance on gold plate, there is nothing improbable in the assumption that it was thought convenient, on its adoption for silver for the reason we have given, to adopt it also for gold for the sake of uniformity in the standard marks. It is an important landmark to the archaeologist, for whilst its presence or absence alone tells him something, the alterations which are observed in its size and shape from time to time are often of material assistance to him in fixing the date of the articles on which it appears. THE LION’S HEAD ERASED AND FIGURE OF BRITANNIA. Of these two marks there is little to be said. They were appointed by the statute of 1696-7, which raised the standard for silver plate from 11 ounces 2 dwts. to 11 ounces 10 dwts. fine, in order to distinguish the plate so made from that which had previously been made of silver of the old sterling, and they were for this purpose sub- stituted for the leopard’s head crowned and lion passant. The new marks were in sole use from March 27, 1697, until June, CHAP. III.] The Sovereigns Head. 6 3 1720, when the old sterling standard was restored and its own old marks with it, not, however, to the exclusion of the new. Since that year, therefore, both standards, each to bear its own marks, have been legal. For some short time after the restoration of the old standard a good deal of plate made of the new or higher standard silver seems still to have been stamped, but it quickly fell into disuse, and, after 1732 or thereabouts, the lion’s head erased and the Britannia are very rarely to he met with. The higher standard is occasionally used even at the present day, and in such cases is of course distinguished by its proper marks. The Britannia stamp is sometimes found of a rectangular and at other times of an oval shape ; in one instance that has come under the writer’s notice it is absent altogether, a set of loving cups of the year 1716 in the possession of the Worshipful Company of Salters hearing no Britannia, hut instead of it a second impression of the lion’s head erased placed beside the first, and of a different size. It may be noted also that several pieces of plate hearing irregular marks occur in the year or two next after the restoration of the old sterling standard in 1720. For old sterling silver some of the punches disused since 1697 seem to have been put into commission again, and confusion was doubtless occasioned by the two sets of marks being in daily use at the assay-office. The writer has seen a candlestick bearing both old and new standard marks. Even more remarkable is a salver of 1721 bearing the Britannia and an old leopard’s head crowned, but both partially obliterated, the former by having a lion passant and the latter a lion’s head erased stamped over it. The original com- bination and the correction are equally without meaning. THE SOVEREIGN’S HEAD. This mark is found on all plate that has been liable to the duty imposed from Dec. 1, 1784 (24 Geo. III. c. 53) ; that is to say, upon all plate liable to be assayed, the only exemptions from the control of the assay-offices, and therefore from duty, being : — (1). Certain gold articles exempted by 12 Geo. II. c. 26.* * 12 Geo. c. 26.— Exemptions : — • s. 2. Any jewellers’ works, that is to say, any gold or silver wherein any jewels or other stones are or shall be set (other than mourn- ing rings), any jointed night ear-rings of gold, or gold springs of lockets. s. 6. Rings, collets for rings, or other jewels, chains, necklace beads, lockets, hol- low or raised buttons, sleeve buttons, thim- bles, corral sockets and bells, ferrils, pipe- lighters, cranes for bottles, very small book- clasps, any stock or garter clasps jointed, very small nutmeg-graters, rims of snuff boxes whereof tops or bottoms are made of 6 4 Old English Plate . f CHAP. HI. (2). Certain silver articles exempted by BO Geo. III. c. 31.* (B). Watch-cases, by B8 Geo. III. c. 24. These are exempted from duty and so from being marked with the Sovereign's bead, but are not amongst the exemptions from the general marking require- ments of 12 Geo. II. c. 26. It will be observed that, from 17B8 until 1790, the silver as well as the gold exempted was so under 12 Geo. II. c. 26, which was repealed in 1790 as to silver by 30 Geo. III. c. 31 ; and it must be added that by 18 & 19 Yict. c. 60, wedding-rings pay duty even though of less weight than 10 dwts. The mark itself, when first introduced, was in intaglio instead of in relief, looking like the matrix of a seal instead of its impression ; in this form it is found in conjunction with the letters i and k, standing for 1784-5 and 1785-6 respectively, specimens of both of which are in the writer’s possession, and the profile is, in these cases, turned to the left. The date letter for 1784-5 is of course sometimes with, and at other times without, the King’s-head mark, the duty not having been imposed till the middle of the Goldsmiths’ year. After the end of 1785-6 it is always found in relief like the other assay-marks, and with the profile to the right. Her most Gracious Majesty Queen Victoria is, however, turned to the left again. A duty of sixpence per ounce troy was first imposed upon plate in 1720 when the old standard of silver was revived and by the same statute (6 Geo. I. c. 11), but it was taken off again in 1758 (31 Geo. shell or stone, sliding pencils, tooth-pick cases, tweezer cases, pencil cases, needle cases, any philligree work, any sorts of tip- pings or swages on stone or ivory cases, any mounts, screws, or stoppers to stone or glass bottles or phials, any small or slight orna- ments put to amber or other eggs or urns, any wrought seals, or seals with cornelians or other stones set therein, or any gold or silver vessel, plate, or manufacture of gold or silver so richly engraved, carved, or chased, ©r set with jewels or other stones, as not to admit of an assay to be taken of, or a mark. to be struck thereon, without damaging, prejudic- ing, or defacing the same, or such other things as by reason of the smallness or thin- ness thereof are not capable of receiving the marks hereinbefore mentioned, or any of them, and not weighing ten pennyweights of gold or silver each. * 30 Geo. III. c. 31.— Exemptions : — s. 3. Chains, necklace beads, lockets, any philligree work, shirt buckles or broaches, stamped medals, or spouts to china, stone or earthenware teapots, or any of them, of any weight whatsoever. s. 4. Tippings, swages or mounts, or any of them, not weighing ten pennyweights of silver each, save and except only necks and collars for castors, cruets or glasses apper- taining to any sort of stands or frames. s. 5. Any wares of silver whatsoever not weighing five pennyweights of silver each, i save and except only the following silver wares (that is to say), necks, collars, and tops for castors, cruets or glasses appertain - ! ing to any sort of stands or frames, buttons ! to be affixed to or set on any wearing apparel, solid sleeve buttons and solid studs, not having a bissilled edge soldered on, wrought seals, blank seals, bottle tickets, shoe clasps, patch Jboxes, salt spoons, salt shovels, salt ladles, tea spoons, tea strainers, i caddy ladles, buckles (shirt buckles or | broaches before mentioned excepted), and pieces to garnish cabinets, or knife cases, or tea chests, or bridles, or stands or frames. The Sovereigns Head. CHAP. III.] 65 II. c. 32) by an act which substituted a dealer s licence costing 40s. per annum.* The act of 1784 re-imposed a duty, but this time of 8s. per ounce on gold plate, as well as 6d. per ounce on silver ; which amounts were, omitting intermediate stages, increased finally in 1815 (55 Geo. III. c. 185) to 17s. per ounce for gold, and Is. 6d. for silver, calculated on ■|tlis of the weight to allow for waste in finishing. At these rates they now stand, the duty being paid through Goldsmiths’ Hall at the time of assaying, and the money is returned with the articles if they are cut as being below the proper standard. A drawback of the whole duty is allowed upon plate made in the United Kingdom for export and exported new. The act of 1784 directed that such plate should be specially marked with a figure of Britannia which was used like the first stamp of the king’s head as an intaglio. This direction was, however, repealed by 25 Geo. III. c. 64, in consequence of the damage done to plate by stamping it after it was finished, and the mark disused after an existence of only seven months. The provisions as to the drawback itself were not altered. Dealers’ licences are now regulated by 30 & 31 Yict. c. 90. Dealers in gold exceeding 2 dwts. and under 2 oz. "1 £2 6s. ,, silver ,, 5 ,, ,, 30 ,, J per annum. ,, gold 2 oz. or upwards ) ,, silver 30 oz. or upwards > £5 15 s. per annum. Gold and silver refiners, etc. ) F CHAPTER IY. THE PROVINCIAL ASSAY TOWNS AND THEIR MARKS PRIOR TO 1701. THE ACT OP 1423 — HISTORICAL NOTES OF THE GOLDSMITHS OP NEWCASTLE AND YORK — THE RELATIONS OP THE LONDON WITH THE PROVINCIAL GOLD- SMITHS FROM TIME TO TIME — EXTINCTION OP THE OLD PROVINCIAL GOLDSMITHS’ COMPANIES IN 1697 — YORK — NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE — NORWICH — CHESTER — EXETER — HULL, GATESHEAD, LEEDS, CARLISLE, LINCOLN, TAUNTON, KING’S LYNN, SANDWICH — DOUBTFUL PROVINCIAL MARKS— TABLE OP OLD PROVINCIAL MARKS. We now come to the consideration of the marks found upon plate assayed in the provinces; but as the act of 1700 established, or in certain cases re-established, the provincial assay-offices on an entirely new basis and with entirely new marks to distinguish them, the history of provincial marks divides itself into two distinct portions, the earlier of which terminates at that year. It is not until 1428, that provincial “touches,” except the touch of York, can with any certainty be said to have existed at all. In very early days all goldsmiths were required to bring their wares to London to be marked; and even in 1879 the enactment found on the Rolls of Parliament for establishing an “assay of the touch” in cities and boroughs under the superintendence of their Mayors and Governors, with the aid of the Master of the Mint, if there be one, who should put the mark of the city or borough where it was assayed upon plate, does not, as we have already seen, appear to have become law. At best, for reasons already given, its provisions were but temporary ; and it is clear that even in parts of England distant from the metropolis there was no general custom at this time of marking plate with peculiar local marks ; indeed, there is some direct evidence to the contrary in the claims of the Wardens of the Goldsmiths in 1404 to have had the right from time immemorial to have the govern- ance of all manner of gold and silver work as well within the city of London “ as elseivhere ivithin the kingdom of England.” Let us quote, as an instance of the exercise of this jurisdiction, the case of one John of Rochester, who, in 1414, was taken by the master of the trade of goldsmiths there for counterfeiting mazer bonds in CHAP. IV.] The Provincial Goldsmiths . 67 copper and brass plated over with silver or gilded, and brought up to London, having sold them within the city.* It is not clear, from this particular instance, whether the jurisdic- tion of the governors of the craft in London would or would not have extended to the case, if the fraudulent wares had been sold as well as made in Rochester ; it only shows that the maker of articles, sold as these were within the City, was amenable to it wherever he resided and worked. Had they been sold in Rochester or elsewhere in the provinces, the case would probably have been dealt with in the same manner, but without bringing the culprit up to London ; the “ venue,” to borrow a legal phrase, would have been local. At all events, with the increase of population, the necessity of sending every article of plate to London to be stamped, became a greater hardship upon country goldsmiths, and the legislation which proposed to meet it in 1879, shows that a need of some such measure was already found to exist. Accordingly, less than half a century later, in 1428, t the divers touches of York, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Lincoln, Norwich, Bristol, Salisbury, and Coventry, were set up “ according to the ordinance of Mayors, Bailiffs, or Governors of the said towns ; ” and it was enacted, “ that no goldsmith nor other workers of silver nor keepers of the said touches within the said towns shall set to sell nor touch any silver in other manner than is ordained before, within the City of London,” upon pain of forfeiture. The act further provides that no goldsmith anywhere in England should work silver of worse allay than the sterling, nor without setting his mark or sign upon it before he set it to sale, upon the same penalties as if in London ; and it empowered justices of the peace, mayors, and bailiffs to hear and enquire of such matters. Mints had been established at York and Bristol in the preceding year, possibly also in the other places now associated with them ; and it is well ascertained that most, if not all, of these cities and towns had guilds or fraternities of goldsmiths already established in them. As to Newcastle-upon-Tyne, it would appear J that at so remote a period as 1249, Henry III. commanded the bailiffs and good men to choose four of the most prudent and trusty men of their town for the office of moneyers there ; and other four like persons for keeping the king’s mint in that town, also two fit and prudent goldsmiths to be assayers of the money to be made there. In 1586, the goldsmiths were, * Riley’s Memorials of London and Lon- don Life , p. 601. f 2 Henry VI. c. 14 (see p. 29). f From An impartial History of the Town and County of Newcastle-upon-Tyne , pub- lished anonymously in 1801, p. 429. 68 Old English Plate. [chap. iy. by an ordinary, incorporated with the plumbers, glaziers, pewterers and painters, and the united Company required to go together, on the Feast of Corpus Christi, and maintain their play of ‘ ‘ the three kings of Coleyn.” They were to have four wardens, one goldsmith, one plumber, one glazier, one pewterer or painter ; and it is quaintly added that no Scotchman born should be taken apprentice or suffered to work in Newcastle. Their hall in Maden Tower was granted them in the mayoralty of Sir Peter Riddell in 1619, and the association of the goldsmiths with the other tradesmen lasted till 1717, when owing to something which necessitated reference to the Recorder, it ceased. They did not, however, take a leading place in this brotherhood, though it will be seen that they were in full work during the latter half of the seventeenth century. There is an exceedingly early mention of Durham work in the Wardrobe accounts of 28 Edward I., in which a pastoral staff is described as “ de opere Dunolm ; ” and as to York, “ coclearia facta in Ebor,” are bequeathed in a York will of as early a date as 1866. In the latter city the art seems to have flourished, and the names of many goldsmiths working there during the second half of the four- teenth and in the following century are known. Alan de Alnewyk, gold- smith of York, whose shop was in “ Stayngate,” bequeaths, in 1874, his tools to his kinsman William, when he shall attain twenty years of age, provided he attain that age “ in bona conversation ad discendum ad scolas et ad artem aurifabri,” quaintly adding “ ac sit humilis, ac bonorum morum nec arguendo uxorem meam,” or in plain English, that he must keep on good terms with the testator’s widow. The names of two goldsmiths, Wormod and Jonyn, almost certainly of York, occur in the will of an archdeacon of Richmond proved at York in 1400 ; and the wife of a third, bearing a no less singular name, Wermbolt Harlam, leaves her gold knopped ring, in 1401, to the wife of John Angowe, a craftsman of the same mystery. Beside these, the wills of two goldsmiths settled at York in the fifteenth century, both of them containing interesting trade details, are to be found amongst those proved in that city. By one of them, John Luneburgh, in 1458, leaves some of his working tools to his friends and fellow goldsmiths, Robert Spicer and John Pudsay, and 6s. 8 d. to the craft — “ auri- fabrorum arti ,” — towards buying a new silver crown. His small stock-in-trade included, amongst other things, the following articles, viz. : — “ incudem meam secundariam et j malleum vocatum j forchyn- gamer, sex limas vocatas files et vj gravers, incudem meam minimi valoris in opella mea j planysshing stithy et j planysshing liamer.” The other will, that of John Colam, dated 1490, gives us a full chap, iv.] The Provincial Goldsmiths. inventory of the working tools and appliances necessary for carrying on the goldsmith’s business, his “ opella,” from its quaint spelling and curious French, and English words, form a list too curious Opella. De j lez wirkyng bord cum j lez deske xx d De ij stethez iij s iiij d De ij sparhawke stethez x d De vi grett lez forgeyng hamers ij 9 De v lez planeshyng hamers xii d De j lez hake hamer et j lez strenyng hamer iij d De v small lez clenches iiij d De ij lez spoyn tayses x d De ij lez stampis xiiij d De iij lez swages vi d De j lez rownde stake cum j lez flatt stake et j lez nebid stake iiij d De iiij paribus de lez sherithez xvi d De j pari de lez spanne taynges cum ij paribus de lez plyorys iii d De ij paribus de lez fyre taynges cum j pari parvo lez taynges vii d De j shavyng hooke cum j lez standard cupri v d De j long lez lokker cum lez pounsones xx d De ij lez drawyng teynges cum ij lez drawyng toyllys xiiij d De ij lez paribus of skaylettes cum pertinentiis iiij d . De j parvo lez stethe cum lez hoy lies in it j d De ij lez yngottes cum j pari lez pounsounes iiij d De j lez lokker cum lez gravers et lez shavers iiij d De j candelabro cum lez fayn j d De j lez lokker cum lez fyilles viiij d De ij aliis lez lokkers cum lez pounsones iiij d De j rownd lez stampe auricalci cum ij lez bossellys ij d De j parvo lez tryblett cum j pair lez wood spanne taynges ob. De iiij lez pattron lokkers cum veteribus lez pattrones viij d De j lez pyill cum iij paribus lez ballance ij s ij d De ij paribus ballance pro auro iiij d De j lez sairse pixide cum j lez reyn spyndyll ij d De j lez gylttyng plater cum pertinentiis iiij d De j enaymelyng lez lokker vi d De j foco cum j pari follium xii d De iij tyn peyces x d De j veteri lez bord cum lez deske iij d De ij lapidibus de lez sclait j d Non legata. De j grett lez pyill weght cum j pari balance’ v s De j osculatorio argenti pond’ xii un. et di„ pris unc. iij s ij d Summa xxxix s vii d De iij mirrarum lez bandys cum j pede murraspond. xii unc. pris unc. iij s iiij d , xl De j mirrae lez band cum j lez lokker cum argento fracto pond, xii un. et di. xli s viii d De j arcu argenti cum catapulto argenti et j nola auri v s De j cocliari argenti sine lez knope xii d De xx peirlys ii s De ij cristaules viii d De iij foliis de lez booke gold iij d De j lez heft cultelli de lez greyn cerpentyn j d De j lez maser shell xii d De j pari balance’ j d ; de j lez stampe iiij 1 * 69 then considered The contents of mixture of Latin, to curtail. [CHAP. IV. 70 Old English Plate . Be j Premario vi d Be ij aliis libris veteribus ij d Be j cresmatorio de lez tyn ij d Be j lez sarce pixid’ ij d Be j pari precularium de le jeitt ij d Le lez swepynges dictse opellse xx s Summa ix H iii s x d ob. Thomas Skelton, goldsmith of York, is found selling mazers in the middle years of the fifteenth century. It is worth noticing that the names of several of these goldsmiths point to their foreign descent. Luneburgli and Harlam must have come from those cities ; Colan, or Colam, was not improbably from Cologne ; and the Christian name of his son Herman, who is mentioned in his will, points in the same direction. But notwithstanding these glimpses of the trades- men of York and their families, there is no single bit of marked plate left to show that this city, nor indeed any of the others, until much later days exercised the privilege conferred upon them in 1379 or in 1423, of touching their plate with their own touches. Very interest- ing documentary evidence lias, however, been found by Canon Raine amongst the archives of York of the existence of a common touch there in 1410-1. In that year a dispute arose in the craft as to whether there should be three or only two “ searchers,” and the ques- tion is laid before the mayor, aldermen, and other good citizens on 5th March, 12 Henry IV., with the result that two searchers, Englishmen born, and no more, were to be chosen and duly sworn. The goldsmiths were to bring their touch and mark “ come la statut purport,” and those who had none, to make themselves new punches “ en complisent de justice come le comune lez eut demand.” They were to forfeit 6s. 8cl., if they sold anything of gold or silver before “ le comune touch de la dite cite ” and its maker’s mark were properly applied to it. All this came under review again in 1561, when the “ ancient ordynances of the mystery or occupation of goldsmiths of the citie of Yorke ” were diligently perused and examined “ by the right worshipfull Parsyvall Crafourth, mayour, the aldremen and pryvay councell” at their assembly in “ the counsell chamber upon Ousebrig,” 10th April, 3 Eliz., and reformed, to be thenceforth firmly observed and kept for ever. Thomas Sympson and Robert Gylmyn, the two searchers under the old ordinances, and the other good men masters of the craft* were present. The old ordinance as regards the two searchers Was ratified and confirmed and as regards makers’ punches. It was also ordained that all work should be “ towelled with the pounce of this citie called the half leopard head and half flowre de luyce ” as the statute purporteth. Gold was to be of the “ touche of Paryse,” CHAP. IV.] The Provincial Goldsmiths . 7i and of silver none of “ worse alaye than sterlyng” might be worked, except that “ sowder ” should he allowed for, under pain of forfeiting the double value. A great deal followed about apprentices and fraudulent work, to a great extent according with the provisions of the Acts of 1404 and 1420, especially as regards work done for Holy Church, knights’ spurs, and so on. From about 1500 the leading craftsmen occasionally figure in the list of the Lord Mayors of York. Thomas Gray serves this office in 1497, William Willson in 1518, George Gaile in 1584, and Ralph Pullein in 1587 ; but then several generations elapse before a goldsmith again attains the civic chair in the person of John Thompson, Lord Mayor in 1685, to be followed in 1697 by Mark Gill. Charles Rhoades was Sheriff in 1694. The mark of each of these worthies occurs upon plate of the period. The goldsmiths in 1628 paid only 2s. a year towards the repair of the Mote Hall called St. Anthony’s Gild, whereas the “ Merchants or Mercers ” paid as much as 5 shillings. To return from this York digression, the act of 1477 speaks of the keepers of the touch in London and other paces ; but in 1488, when the statute of that year notices “ the rule and order of the mints of London, Calice, Canterbury, York, and Durham,” also of “ the Gold- smiths’ Hall of London,” and recites that “ finers and parters dwell abroad in eveiy part of the realm out of the rules aforesaid,” no men- tion is made of any of the country assay offices ; and it may be pre- sumed that they did little or no business towards the end of that century. Even later, in 1509, it is expressly stated in one of the charters of the Goldsmiths’ Company in London, that search for and punishment of abuses in the trade was but seldom executed out of London. Possibly the supervision of the Goldsmiths’ Company in London was exercised at first in a spirit that did not encourage the develop- ment of the trade in the provinces ; for the confirmation of their charter by Edward IY. in 1462, gave them the inspection, trial, and regulation of all gold and silver wares, not only in London, but in all other parts of the kingdom ; and these powers were continually exer- cised, periodical progresses being made by the assay wardens through- out the country for the purpose. It is recorded in 1493, that the costs of the wardens to “ Sturbitch Fair,” amounted to 4>2 ; and from the accounts relating to. the sixteenth century we may take the follow- ing extracts : — “ 1512. Agreed that Mr. Wardens shall ride into the country this year, to make search 4 in div r s feyres, cytyes, and townys,’ as they had done in tymes past.” “1517. Agreed ‘that the wardens shall rydeat'Seynt Jamys’ Feyre’ 72 [chap. iv. Old English Plate. and to sucli other places and towns in the west parts of England as they shall think most necessary.” But such circuits as these were clearly not every-day events ; it would seem as if nothing of the kind had taken place for some years previously to 1512, and the provincial authorities did but little in the absence of any higher supervision. Much more plate was melted than made during the half century which followed this outburst of energy ; and country goldsmiths gradually fell, equally no doubt with those of London, into the abuses which called so loudly for enquiry at the commencement of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Up to that time at all events their work does not seem to have been held in very high estimation. The touches of London and Paris are constantly mentioned in the wills and inven- tories of the fifteenth century ; that of Bruges is also occasionally referred to ; but no mention will be found of any English touch except that of London : and in the inventories of church furniture made in the reign of Edward VI., in which the names of many London gold- smiths occur, there are not to be found those of any provincial crafts- men, even in the case of parishes far from the capital, and compara- tively near one or other of the local centres at which that mystery would seem to have had a settlement. This is the more significant, as in the self-same documents the sale of pewter to pewterers resident in various country towns is recorded, which would warrant a presump- tion that broken or superfluous silver plate would have been in like manner disposed of to neighbouring goldsmiths, had there been any such to be found. The country goldsmiths shared, however, in the general revival of the trade that now followed, and provincial marks are often found on Elizabethan church plate, which is still in abundance in every part of England. This is especially the case in the neighbourhood of Norwich, York, and Exeter ; but in most other districts, even when remote and inaccessible from London, the occurrence of any marks but those of the Goldsmiths’ Company is very rare. The wardens in 1567 were again directed to “ryde a searchynge this year to Sturbridge ” and were allowed four pounds for their charge “according to the old custom ” ; this again showing that such an expedition was not undertaken every year. The mints in the provinces did not flourish so well, for the precious metals were somewhat scarce, and much was being made into plate. Harrison, chaplain to Lord Cobham, writing in 1586, says that divers mints had been suppressed within his own recollection, “ as South- warke and Bristow, and all coinage brought up to one place, that is to say, the Tower of London.” CHAP. IV.] The Provincial Goldsmiths. Domestic as well as ecclesiastical plate of country manufacture is not unknown, and the goldsmiths of York and Norwich commanded a good deal of the custom of their counties. Apostles’ spoons are marked at Norwich and Exeter in some quantity from 1560 — 1650, some of the plate of the Corporation of Norwich was home made between 1560 and 1570, and specimens of plate of all kinds from that time down to the end of the seventeenth century are referable to the goldsmiths of York. It is difficult to reconcile this entirely with the account given of the provincial assay offices by the author of the Touchstone , who writes thus of them in 1676 somewhat more contemptuously than they would otherwise seem to deserve: “but what are the particular Marks the respective chief Governors of those seven places set on the Silver works I can give no account thereot. But this I can assert, that by reason the Marks of those places are little known they bear as little Credit, and therefore the Goldsmiths in those and other remote places do frequently send up their Silver Works to receive the London touch." Our practical author remarks upon the obligation of country gold- smiths to make their marks known, not only to the local chief magi- strate but to the wardens of the London goldsmiths, who had the ultimate supervision of the craft in all places, including the seven towns ; and goes on to comment upon the danger provincial corpora- tions ran of losing their charters and being disfranchised in conse- quence of lax exercise of their duties and privileges, especially “now since by the favour of our King’s predecessors and their Parliaments Goldsmiths in those seven towns are remitted those extremities of bringing their vessels of silver to London to be stamped with the Leopard Head, but are allowed each of them a Touch by themselves to pass their w'orks upon.” Pie refers also to the debased quality of work executed in country places, in consequence of the remissness of the magistracy in prose- cuting their authority in making search, assaying and marking the goldsmiths’ work, and of the infrequency with which the Wardens of the Goldsmiths of London made search in the country, and strongly recommends intending purchasers of plate to spend their money in London.* If this was all true, it is not surprising to find that in 1697 when, owing to the scarcity of silver coin, it was desirable to encourage per- sons having wrought plate to bring it to be coined, although it was provided that such plate as plainly appeared to have thereupon “ the mark commonly used at the hall belonging to the company of Gold- * Touchstone for Gold and Silver Wares, pp. 107, 108, 2nd ed. 74 [chap. IV. Old English Plate. smiths in London, besides the workman’s mark,” should he received at the mints without question, and paid for at the rate of 5s. 4:d. per oz., no cognizance was taken of any other marks. All plate not bear- ing the above marks was to he melted and assayed before it was allowed for, unless the vendor were satisfied with a rough valuation made upon oath by the master of the mint. Lastly, whether pro- sperous or not up to the year 1697, the provincial offices were all then extinguished at a blow, for the further provisions of this Act,* after proceeding to establish a higher national standard of fineness for silver plate as a protection to the coinage which its earlier clauses were in- tended to call into existence, entrusted the marking of all new plate to the warden of the craft of the Goldsmiths only, and made no mention of any other corporations whatever. That great inconvenience was, by this measure, occasioned to the gold- smiths remote from the city of London is clear from the preamble of the Act by which, only three years later, in 1700-1, this hardship was removed by the appointment of wardens and assay masters for assaying wrought plate in the cities of York, Exeter, Bristol, Chester and Norwich, being the cities in which mints had then lately been erected for re-coin- ing the silver moneys of the kingdom. Newcastle-upon-Tyne was added to the number in 1702. The next chapter will he devoted to these modern offices and their marks; meanwhile it will he convenient to notice in detail the ancient marks used in the places now under consideration. The ground may he somewhat cleared by saying that nothing, is known at present of any of the touches appointed in 1428, except those of York, Norwich, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Minting cer- tainly was carried on at Bristol ; but there are only the faintest indica- tions that goldsmith’s work proper was ever carried on there, nor can any town marks he appropriated to either Lincoln, Bristol, Salisbury, or Coventry. It is very probable that none of them ever availed them- selves of their privileges at all as far as assaying plate is concerned. Casual mention of goldsmiths at Bristol is all that is found in early records. One William Haltehy dwelt at the end of the bridge of Avon there in 1896, and in a will of 1414 Edward Pounsot is said to have then lately possessed houses in Horse Street. These men are both styled goldsmiths. Goldsmiths dwelling in the “ Goldesmythes Rewe, nowe y callyd the Cooky n Rewe,” are mentioned amongst the bene- factors of the church of All Halow Bristowe in a ledger belonging to that church, and this entry may he attributed to the first half of the fifteenth century. Early as this the row named after them had there- fore lost its name. As to Lincoln too, there is some indirect evidence 8 & 9 Will. III., c. 8. CHAF. IV.] The Provincial Goldsmiths. 75 that it never marked plate, from the fact that in no less than nine Lincolnshire parishes, Elizabethan church plate is known with the same maker’s mark without the mark of any town. The mark (an M with an I above it on a shield of very peculiar shape) is presumably that of a goldsmith residing at Lincoln. Two cities, on the other hand, the origin of whose right to stamp plate is unknown — Exeter and Chester — used marks from early times. Hull made and marked plate in the seventeenth century. These, together with the York and Norwich marks and perhaps that of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, can alone be allotted with certainty to their proper localities. YORK. It has at length proved possible, by the documentary evidence referred to on a preceding page, to identify the well-known old English mark of a fleur-de-lys and leopard’s head crowned, both being dimidiated and conjoined in a plain circular shield, as that which was anciently used at York. The number and locale of the specimens on which it had been found by the writer and others had already left the matter no longer open to question, but until lately the evidence had been wholly circumstantial. Unfortunately, the mark itself being only found on old and often much-worn plate, and being nearly always very indistinct, the dimidiated leopard’s head looks so much more like a half rose that it long seemed hazardous to say which it was intended for. It is now, however, clearly proved to be the half of a leopard’s head crowned. The exact date of its introduction is still unknown ; but as it is always accompanied by an alphabetical letter, it can be traced to about the commencement of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, which seems to have inaugurated a new era for the York goldsmiths. A date-letter was then or thenabouts adopted for the first time, and very probably in consequence of the inquiry into the working of the craft which took place in 1561. Twenty- four or twenty-five letters must have been used, the omitted letters being I or J, and sometimes U or V. A table containing the known instances, and carried down to 1698, is given at the end of this volume. The following are the articles which have served as authority for the construction of this table ; many of them, it will be observed, are actually dated, and the fashion of the others enables them to be placed, without any hesitation, in their proper cycles. The names, which are now added to the initials from the documentary evidence kindly contributed by Canon Eaine, through the author’s friend, Mr. T. M. Fallow, have corroborated in detail the correct 76 Old English Plate. [chap. IV. ness of the York date-letter tables, which were originally compiled by the author without any better help than the specimens of plate which came to his notice from time to time. Examples of Old York Plate. Date. Maker’s Mark and Name. Article. 1570 HH Thos. Symson, 1548* . . Communion cup and cover. — Salkeld, Cumb. Do. ® Christopher Hunton, 1551 Communion cup. — Thorpe Basset, Yorks. Do. © William Foster, 1569, d. 1610. Communion cup. — Old Byland, Yorks. Do. Robert Beckwith . . I Communion cups.- — St. Mary Bishop- hill, junior ; and St. Maurice, York. Also Roxby, Barnby-upon- Don, and Ampleforth, Yorks. Do. Robert Gylmyn, 1550 Communion cups. — Crofton, South Stainley, and East Cowton, Yorks. Communion cup. — Rufforth, Yorks. Do. George Kitchen, 1561, d. 1597. 1571 * Robert Gylmyn, as in Communion cup, with crossed belts 1570. but no foliage. — Handsworth, Yorks. 1 157G m R. Gylmyn, see 1570 Seal-headed spoon. — Rev. T. Stani- forth. ! 1577 G. Kitchen, as in 1570 . Mount of stoneware jug, dated 1576. — From the Addington Collection. ! 1579 Small communion cup, with peculiar Elizabethan belt. — Adwick - on- Dearne, Yorks. 1583 m William Rawnson . . Communion cup. — Long Preston , j Yorks. 1585 Do. Do Communion cup, rude Elizabethan belt. — Troutbeck, Westmoreland. 1593 R. Gylmyn, as in 1576 Seal-headed spoon. — Rev. T. Stani- forth. Do. William Rawnson, see Communion cup, with usual belt. — 1583. Crathorne, Yorks. 1600 Do. Do Communion cup, from a church near Cawood, Yorks. — T. W. U. Robin- son, Esq. 1608 |PPj Peter Pearson, 1603 . . Communion cup. — Brantingham, Yorks. 1609 Do. j Do Communion cup with cover, dated 1609. — Sutton-on-Derwent, Yorks. Do. [ft] Francis Tempest, 1597 . Communion cup. — Cottam, Yorks. 1611 Peter Pearson, as in 1608 Cup, gift of Coniston Wrightington. — Trinity House, Hull. 1612 fell Chris. Harrington, 1595, Small communion cup. — Patterdale, d. 1614. Cumb. 1613 Do. Do Communion cup with engraved belt. — Pickering, Yorks. * When a date follows the name, it is the year in which the goldsmith took up his freedom. The date of his death is given where known. CHAP. IV. | York. 77 Date. Maker’s Mark and Name. | Article. 1014 Do. Chris. Harrington, 1595 ; Beaker cup. — From the Dasent Col- d. 1614. lection. 1615 1 Do. Do Apostle spoon. — Rev. T. Staniforth. Do. | Francis Tempest, as in Communion cup. — Irthington, Cumb. | 1609. Do. Peter Pearson, as in 1608 Communion cup, dated 1615. — Slingsby, Yorks. 1 Do. | [CMl Chris. Mangy, 1609 . . Communion cup, dated 1615. — St. Cuthbert’s, York. 1617 ; Francis Tempest, as in Communion cup, Elizabethan belt. — 1609. Cleator, Cumb. Do. Do. . Communion cup. — Hemingbro, Yorks. Do. .... Do. . Do. — Spennithorne, Yorks. 1619 Sem Casson, 1613 . Do. — Bilbrough, Yorks. 1622 j e 1 Peter Pearson, as in 1608. Silver rim, dated 1622, under Scrope mazer. — York Minster. Do fR® Robert, son of Christr. Communion cup. — Darton, Yorks. Harrington, 1616, d. 1647. 1623 • . • Peter Pearson, as in 1608. Com. cup and cover. — Holy Trin., Goodramgate, York. 1624 \rwJ Robert Williamson, 1623, d. 1667. Communion cup. — Howden, Yorks. 1625 S. Casson, as in 1619. Do. — Naburn, York. 1626 ’ 6H)’ Thos., son of Christr. Harrington, 1624, d. Apostle spoon. — Rev. T. Staniforth. 1642. 1627 • . • . | Communion cup. — Cawthorne, Yorks. 1628 Robert Harrington, as in Do. — Thornton Watlass, Yorks. 1622. Do. James Plummer, 1616, d. 1663. Do. — Hayton, Yorks. 1630 Christr. Mangy, as in 1615 Do., dated 1630. — Bewcastle. Cumb. 1631 S. Casson, as in 1619 Do. — Pickhill, Yorks. Do. Robert Harrington, as in Do. — Ebberston, Yorks. 1622. Do. James Plummer, as in Do. — Headingley, Yorks. 1628. Do. Christr. Mangy, as in 1615 Do. — Thirsk, Yorks. Do. 'em ' ! Thos. Waite, 1613, d. 1662 Com. cup, given by Abp. Harsnet, in j 1630. — All Saints, North St., York. 1632 1 Robert Williamson, as in Communion cup. — Calverlev, York. 1624. 1633 Robert Harrington, as in Cup and paten, dated 1633. — Chapel 1622. Allerton, Yorks. Do. Com. cup. — St. Helen’s, York. Do. Do., dated 1632. — Kirkby Malham, Yorks. Do. .... Thos. Harrington, as in Communion cup. — St. Olave’s, York. 1626. 1634 1 James Plummer, as in Do. — Danby Wiske, Yorks. 1628. Do. Robert Williamson, as in Do. — Bilton-in-Ainsty, Yorks. 1624. Do. Thos. Waite, as in 1631 . Do., Elizn. belt. — Burton-in-Kendal, Westmor. 1635 Thos. Harrington, as in Do., plain pricked belt, dated 1634. — i 1626. Threlkeld, Cumbj. 78 Old English Plate. [chap. IV. Date. Maker’s Mark and Mame. Article. 1635 [rrl John Thompson, 1633 ; d. Com. cup. — Conistone Kilnsey, Yorks. w 1692. 1636 Thos. Harrington, as in Do. — Cundall, Yorks. 1626. j Do. j James Plummer, as in Do. — Northallerton, Yorks. j 1628. | 1637 FB ' Francis Bryce, 1 634 Plain cup on baluster stem (bearing an inscription relating to Norwich, 1 dated 1578). — Formerly in the Bohn j collection. Do. Robert Harrington, as in Do. — Lanercost. — Cumb. i 1622. ! Do. James Plummer, as in Do. — Billingham, Durh. 1628. 1638 James Plummer, as in Cup and paten. — Flaxton, Yorks. ; 1628. Do. iTHl Thos. Harrington, 1624 ; Communion cup, dated 1728. — Scam- V®/ d. 1642. monden, Yorks. Do. Robert Harrington, as in Cup and paten. — Levisham, Yorks. 1622. Do. Robert Williamson, as in Plain com. cup. — Elmley, Yorks. 1624. 1639 Robert Harrington, as in Communion cup. — Hunmanby, Yorks. 1622. Do. Robert Williamson, as in Do. dated 1638. — Thorner, Yorks. j 1624. 1 1640 Thos. Harrington, as in Com. cup. — Kirkandrew’s-upon-Esk, j 1638. Cumb. 1641 Robert Harrington, as in Cup, used as Com. cup, dated 1640. — 1 1622. Cuisbro’, Yorks. Do. . . . . John Thompson, as in Cup and paten. — Melsonby, Yorks. | 1635. 1642 Thos. Harrington, as in Communion cup. — Wheldrake, Yorks. 1 1638. 1654 Communion cup. — Stockton - on - Forest, Yorks. 1655 .... Beaker used as Com. cup. — Cumber- worth, Yorks. 1657 SB John, son of James Plum- Paten. — Stillingfleet, Yorks. mer, 1648. 1660 Do. Do Cup, gift of R. Hunter, who died 1659. — Thornton Dale, Yorks. Do. {Kb} Marmaduke Best, 1657 . Tankard, given 1666. — Corpn. of Hull. 1661 John Plummer, as in 1657 Spoon, flat stem. — Rev. T. Stani- j forth. 1662 Do Cup and paten cover, dated 1663. — Aldbrough, Yorks. Do. Do Com. cup, undated. — Otley, Yorks. Do. Do Do., dated 1663. — Brafferton, Yorks. Do. Do., dated 1662. — Birkin, Yorks. Do. Marmaduke Best, as in Do., and cover, undated. — Healaugh, 1660. Yorks. Do. XJ*J Robert, son of Robert Do. — Alne, Yorks. Williamson, 1653. 1663 1 Marmaduke Best, as in I Cup and paten cover. — Bolton Abbey, 1660. Yorks, CHAP. IV.] York. 79 Date. Maker’s Mark and Name. Article. 1663 George, son of Chris- Cup and paten, dated 1663. — St. topher Mangy, 1638 ; living 1666. Mary, Cottingham, Yorks. 1664 . Robt. Williamson, as in Com. cup and paten. — Tadcaster, 1662. Yorks. Do. John Plummer, as in 1657 Large paten, dated 1666. — Beverley Minster. Do. (tm) Thos., son of Geo. Mansy, Communion cup. — Catterick, Yorks. 1664. 1667 Do. Do Large repousse dish on foot, given 1668. — Corporation of Hull. 1668 Marmaduke Best, as in Communion cup and cover. — Cart- 1660. mel, Lancashire. 1669 Thos. Mangy, as in 1664 Communion cup. — Sandal, Yorks. Do. Philemon Marsh, 1652 ; Silver lining, dated 1669, of Scrope d. 1672. mazer. — York Minster. Do. . Thos. Mangy, as in 1664 Paten, dated 1669. — Almondbury, Yorks. Also plain cup on balus- ter stem, dated 1670. — Edmund James, Esq. 1671 . . . , John Plummer, as in 1657 Communion cup, dated 1671. — Bar- ningham, Yorks. 1672 Marmaduke Best, as in Gold loving cup, dated 1672. — Cor- poration of York. 1660. Do. Cup and paten cover, gift of Leonard Milbourne, who died in 1672.— Skelton, Cumberland. Do. Do. Do., no cover, given by the same. — Ousby, Cumb. & William Mascall, 1664 . Candlesticks, dated 1673. — York Minster. 1673 .... Marmaduke Best, as in Communion cup. — Appleton-on-Wisk, 1660. Yorks. Do. • William Mascall, as in Communion cup. — Penistone, Yorks. 1672. Do. @5 John Thompson, see 1635. Paten.— St. Cuthbert’s, York. 1674 (rw) \*/ Robert Williamson, see Cup and cover, dated 1674. — St. Mary 1662. Bishophill, senior, York. Do. • • • • Marmaduke Best, as in Tankard, dated 1674. — Corporation 1660. of York. Do. .... John Plummer, as in 1657 Another. Do. Norwich. Do. Estoile of six rays Communion cup, undated. — Beighton, Norf. Do. Peter Peterson, as in 1564 Communion cups, all dated 1567. — Buxton, Bressingham, Pulham, and Aylsham, Norf. Do. Do Communion cup, dated 1568 (formerly at Raveningham, Norf.). — A. H. Church, Esq. Do. [pi] Maidenhead, in plain shield. Do. undated. — Newton, Booton, and Skeyton, Norf. Do. Do Do. dated 1567. — Oulton and Cawston, Norf. Do. Do Do. dated 1568. — Northwold, Norf. Do. Do Do. undated (formerly at Whissonsett, Norf.). — Edm. James, Esq. Do. [*] Trefoil slipped in plain KS shield. Do. dated 1567. — Erpingham, and Beeston Regis, Norf. ; also Wenhaston, Suffolk. Do. Do Do. undated. — North Tuddenham, Norf. Civic plate, dated 1568. — Corporation of Do. Do Norwich. Do. Flat fish in oval shield. Communion cup and paten, dated 1568. — Sail, Norf., and St. Martin-at-Oak, Norwich. Do. Do Communion cup, undated. — Winfarthing, Norf. 1567 Peter Peterson, as in 1564 Standing salt, gift of Peter Reade, who died 1568. — Corporation of Norwich. Do. Do Communion cup and paten. — St. Martin’s-at- Palace, Norwich. Do. Cross pattee Cup and paten, dated 1570. — St. Stephen’s, Norwich. 1568 ijfcj Probably Peterson Cup and paten, undated. — Haddiscoe, Norf. Do. Mount of stoneware jug.— Edm. James, Esq. 1627 A Pegasus . . . . Flagon, dated 1628. — St. Gregory’s, Norwich. 1632 Two horses passant and Communion cup, dated 1632. — Great Melton, counterpassant, the one surmounting the other. Norf. Do. Cj&) Lion rampant, in shaped shield. Do., dated 1634, — SS, Simon and Jude, Norwich. 86 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IV. Date. Maker’s Mark. Article. 1634 Paten, dated 1635. — Booton, Norf. Do. Paten, undated. — Cawston, Norfolk. Do. Lion rampant, in shaped shield, as in 1632. Paten of communion cup, dated 1634. SS. Simon and Jude, Norwich. 1636 A large bird . . . . Button-headed spoon, dated 1636, — Rev. T. Staniforth. 1638 Do j Paten, undated. — Skeyton, Norf. 1640 ; Communion cup, dated 1640. — Lamas, Norf. 1061 c. 1662 c. 1675 1675 1679 1680 1680 1685 c. 1689 1691 1692 1694 c. 1695 Do. c. 1696 c. 1697 Table II. c. 1650-1700. [ ¥1 ra My [7a| Do. do. do. Do. I$l ffl w Do. do. if do. Do. do. do. do. As on Bp.’s plate of c. P^rj do. Palace Chapel 1662. d0< As paten, 167. Hugate. 5. — St. Peter’s, m l*kj i 1 [;#• © Do. do. do. Do. do. do. do. Do. do. \±y ED do. Do. do. 1 do. Do. do. (13 do. Do. do. Do. do. • • • rtrl W\ Communion cup, dated 1661. — South wold. Suff. Communion plate, given c. 1662. — Bishop’s Palace Chapel, Norwich. Paten, undated. — Pakenham, Suff. Taten, dated 1675. — St. Peter’s, Hungate, Norwich. Paten, dated 1679. — St. Peter’s, Mounter- gate, Norwich. Cup and paten, dated 1680. — Melton Con- stable, Norfolk. Communion cup, dated 1680. — East Dere- ham, Norf. Paten, dated 1685. — Frostenden, Suff. (town mark illegible). Tankard, c. 1689. — Rev. H. P. Marsham, Rippon Hall, Norwich. Flagon, dated 1691. — St. Michael’s-at-Plea, Norwich. Paten, dated 1692. — St. Paul’s, Norwich. Basin, dated 1694. — St. Stephen’s, Norwich. Flat-handled spoon — late Albert Way, Esq. Do., dated 1695.— Rev. W. Jex Blake, Thur- garton, Suff. Fluted porringer, c. 1696.— R. Fitch, Esq., Norwich. Flat-handled spoon (maker’s mark illegible). — Per Rev. C. R. Manning. CHESTER. The goldsmiths of Chester, though not mentioned in 1423, are known to have enjoyed chartered privileges from an early date — local tradition says from the time of Edward I. This seems to some extent borne out by references to ancient charters in the records still pre- served at Chester. There is a full list of the members of the guild, ClIAP. IV.] Chester. *1 including its aldermen and stewards, for the year 1585, and a notice of the admission of a brother even earlier, on October 4th, 1578. There is certainly reason to believe that a charter granted by Queen Elizabeth was only a confirmation of ancient rights, for there is no mention of the receipt of a charter as if for the first time, nor of the fresh formation of a company in the records of that date. Minutes regulating the trade are found entered in the hooks before we come to the above entry of 1573, and they are presumably of earlier date. One of them ordains as follows : — “ It ra that noe brother shall delevere noe plate by him wrought unles his touche he marked and set upon the same heffore deleverie thereof upon paine of forfeture of everie deffalt to be levied out of his goods iij # inf.” Another quaint notice is to the following effect : — “ It is agreed by the consent of the Alderman and Steward of the Gouldsmyths that who soe ever shall make the hell that slialbe made against Shrouftide ffor the Sadlers shall have ffor his paines iij s iiij ,(Z and yf any of the Compeney shall offend in the premisses shall pay unto the Alderman and Steward ane the reste of the Compeney being iij s A d . “And yt all the oulde hells slialbe broke and not any of the Com- peney to by any to be new burnished or sould to the peneltie aforesaid . ... £ 7 i) 11J Hi/. There are, however, few or no remains of the work of these ancient artificers. The large silver-gilt mace belonging to the Mayor and Corporation, which was given by the Earl of Derby when he was Mayor in 1668, is stamped with a goldsmith’s mark and the arms of the city of Chester as they were then borne, viz., three lions ramp., dim., impaled with three gerbes, dim. It bears neither leopard’s head, lion passant, nor annual date-letter, and the marks which are there have been nearly obliterated when the mace was re-gilt. It is almost too late in the day for the antiquary to suggest that when ancient plate is repaired or re-gilt, silversmiths should be careful not to deface the marks, for many are past recall. Possibly now that the interest, and therefore value, which attaches to plate of which the precise age and date can be ascer- tained is better understood, the danger lies in the opposite direction. On this point the “ Quarterly Review ” has taken occasion to make a remark which will be borne out by the experience of every one who has studied the matter, namely, that the region over which the forger seems to have specially delighted to range is England, outside the metropolitan district. The fraudulent worker has availed himself freely of the field afforded by the doubtful provincial marks, and the buyer 88 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IV. cannot be too much on his guard against being imposed upon by pieces of apparently ancient plate, bearing what purport to be marks of this description. Returning to Chester, it may be said that its history as an assay town practically commences with its charter from King James II. in 1685. The first notice in the hooks of the Goldsmiths’ Company there of the marks to be used, is of the following year, 1686, a date which barely anticipates the modern re-settlement of 1701. The following extracts are all that relate to the subject down to 1697, when the ancient offices were extinguished. 1686. Feb. 1st. And it is further concluded that the Warden’s Marks shall be the Coat and crest of the Citty of Chester * on two punsons with a letter for the year. 1687. Paid for ye tuches engraving 0120 „ for ye three punsons 0 00 6 1690. June 2nd. And the same day the letter was changed from A to B, and so to continue for one year. 1692. April. Paid for a puncheon and engraving ye letter C . . . 16 1692. Nov. Paid Mr. Bullen for coper plate and punson . . .. 00 04 00 1694. Paid Mr. Bullen for a new letter punson 01 00 1697. Paid for the punson and carriage 05 8 This points to the adoption of a date letter in the year 1689, and the regular change of letter each year following. The copper bought by Mr. Bullen, in 1692, might be the very plate that is now preserved in the Chester Assay Office, but none of the punch marks with which it is covered seem referable to an earlier date than 1701. The alphabet adopted in 1689 was, it is believed, of Roman capitals. They are so given in the minutes, though this is not, of course, con- clusive evidence. In any case, it must have come to a premature end with the letter i for 1697-8. This fragment of an alphabet is given after the old Norwich alphabets, in Appendix B. EXETER. Although there are no records of an assay office at Exeter until the commencement of its modern history, an ancient guild of goldsmiths flourished in that city. Much of the church and domestic plate of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in the counties of Devon and Cornwall bears the old Exeter mark, which was a large Roman capital letter X crowned. Examples of it are not uncommonly found even in other parts of England. Hardly any two marks are exactly alike, For the coat of the city, see preceding page ; its crest was a sword erect. CHAP. IV.] Exeter. 89 some of them being surrounded with a plain, others with a dotted, circle ; whilst in later times than Elizabethan the escutcheon follows the shape of the contained letter. Very occasionally the X is not crowned. In the sixteenth century, the letter, enclosed in a plain or dotted circle, is usually accompanied by two pellets, mullets, or quatrefoils, one in each side angle of the X, but in the next century these are wanting. I 11 the case of spoons it is always found in the howls in the usual place. It is almost invariably accompanied by a maker’s mark, which is the whole, or sometimes what seems to be a part, of the surname, and, in the latter cases, somewhat unintelligible. A good many of the Elizabethan Communion cups still to be seen in Exeter parish churches, nearly all of them being of the years 1572, 1578, or 1574, bear the word IONS with or without the crowned X, and this same mark is found on many village communion cups of the same date and fashion in Devon and Cornwall. At Trevalga, it appears on a com- munion cup and paten with the Exeter mark and dated 1571, and at Littleham near Bideford on a cup of 1576. The latest example at present noted is of 1579. We are fortunately enabled to identify this as the mark of an Exeter craftsman of that day by an entry in the Churchwardens’ accounts of St. Petrock’s in that city, which records that in 1571 they paid “ Iohn Ions Goldsmith for changing the chalice into a cup £ 1 . 15 s. 5d.” the cup itself engraved with the date of 1572 on its paten-cover, and duly marked by its maker, being still the property of the parish, which duly values so interesting a posses- sion. Two stoneware jugs, in the possession of the Kev. T. Stanifortli, have respectively ESTON and EASTON as their makers’ marks, whilst a third, formerly in the Bernal collection, bears the word HORWOOD ; all these are accompanied by the usual Exeter mark. ESTON is found on a Communion cup at St. Andrew’s, Plymouth, of which the date is 1590, and EASTON on the cup at Venn Ottery, dated 1582. A kind of rude letter C is usually found with the ESTON mark which may be the initial of that maker’s Christian name. To another mark, that of one RADCLIFF, as in the case of the IONS and ESTON marks, it is possible to assign a date, for it appears on a cup at St. Petrock’s church in Exeter, engraved with 1640, a date which corresponds well with the year 1687 pounced on an apostle spoon with the same maker’s mark, in Mr. Staniforth’s collection. These last each bear the makers’ initials, on a separate stamp, as well as his name in full, and are good examples of the 90 Old English Plate . [chap. IV. Exeter mark of the time. The mark on the apostle spoon is as follows : — RADCLIFF That on the cup gives the same initials in monogram instead of with the little flowers between them, the other marks being the same as those on the spoon. An earlier form of the Exeter mark will he found in the Table at the end of this chapter. The name COTON occurs upon church-plate of the Elizabethan period some- times with D and sometimes with I for initial letter. Spoons occasionally bear the initials in the howl, instead of the crowned X, and have the whole name on the back of the stem ; some seal -headed baluster- stemmed spoons among the domestic plate still in use at Cotehele, the ancient Cornish seat of the Earls of Mount Edgcumbe, bear TM in monogram within a dotted circle in their bowls, and 1NMHVI on the stems : on others the word IBEM-Yl is to be found, with the Exeter mark in the bowl. YEDS occurs on a flat-stemmed spoon, and on an apostle spoon of Mr. Staniforth’s, both of which bear the Exeter mark. OSBORN with the Exeter mark is the name on an apostle spoon with pricked date 1688, and also on a lion sejant spoon dated in the same way 1663. It is impossible to say for certain, even after the examination of so many specimens as are described here, whether a date-letter was ever used at Exeter. The stoneware jugs and the Communion cups of the Elizabethan period sometimes bear two letters, one of which might be for dating them, but nothing at all like a date-letter is found upon spoons. On nearly all the Communion cups which bear the mark IONS, the Roman letter I is to be seen put on in such a way that it might be a date-letter or the initial of the maker’s name. But as these could hardly all have been made in exactly the same year, and as on other Exeter examples, a letter which is known to be the maker’s initial is found as well as his name, it would be almost safe to say that this letter I is not a date-letter. C is in this way found with ESTON or EASTON, and T with MATHEV. The date of the latter is probably 1565 to 1585. Further research may clear up this question, but it is almost certain that a date- letter was not regularly used in the sixteenth, and not at all in the seventeenth, century. The specimens in the following table bear of course the Exeter mark, as well as the maker’s and other marks given against each. CHAP. IV.] Hull. 9i Examples of Old Exetee Plate. Date. Makers’ Marks. Article. 1571 ft! |lONS| Communion cup and paten cover, dated 1571. — Tre- valga, Cornwall. 1572 Do. Do., dated 1572. — St. Petrock’s, Exeter. 1571 Do. Do., dated 1571. — St. Winnoe, Cornwall. c. 1575 D CQTON Communion cup. — Stoke Rivers, Devon. c. 1575 1 COTON Do. — Morwenstow, Cornwall. 1575 ffl IToNSlfAl Cap and cover, dated 1575. — Lympston, Devon. N. D. 1575 1576 1576 Do. Ho] Rons] [Sl f?l | MUT£V| hoNsinn Do., undated.— St. Kerrian’s (now with St. Petrock), Exeter. Paten cover, dated 1575. — Duloe, Cornwall. Communion cup with paten cover, dated 1576.— St. Gennys, Cornwall. Do., dated 1576. — Tamerton Foliot, and Littleham, Devon. 1576 IestonI Do., dated 1576. — Stockleigh Pomeroy, Devon. Do. U1 [ions 1 IbI Do., dated 1576. — Perran-Uthnoe, Cornwall. 1581 [cj IestonI Mount of stoneware jug, dated 1581. — Menheniot, Cornwall. 1582 Ieaston 1 Cup and paten cover, dated 1582. — Venn Ottery, Devon. Do. [cl IestonI Communion cup, dated 1582. — Cadbury, Devon. 1590 1637 FgI IestonI InI IRADCLIFF I Communion cup and cover, dated 1590. — St. Andrew’s Plymouth. Apostle spoon, pricked date, 1637. — Rev. T Staniforth. 1638 Iosborn] Apostle spoon, pricked date, 1638. — Sir T. Thornhill, Bart. 1610 Irad cliff] Communion cup, dated 1610. — St. Petrock’s, Exeter. HULL. The mark now to be mentioned is one that can no longer be called doubtful. Though Hull had been made a mint town in 28 Edw. I. it was not included in the Act of 1428, and does not seem to have assayed plate in early times ; hut in and near that town there is a great deal of plate of the seventeenth century hearing the town arms of three ducal crowns one above another for assay mark. So much, indeed, is to be found, that it would almost lead to the conclusion that Hull must have had some charter such as those which Exeter and Chester are supposed to have enjoyed, entitling its goldsmiths to their own proper provincial mark. The “ Company of Goldsmiths and Braziers” there are found presenting a petition to James II. with 92 Old English Plate . [chap. iv. other loyal burgesses of the town. To set against this it must be said that the Hull mark only occurs, just when other unauthorised marks were much in vogue. Further it is not mentioned by the author of the Touchstone in 1676; nor was it recognised by the Acts of 1701 and 1702, any more than in 1423. It is clear, however, that whether authorised or not to use a special mark of its own, the goldsmiths residing there did a good trade amongst their neighbours, at all events from about 1625 to nearly the end of the century. About 25 specimens have come to light, hearing various dates from 1621 to 1697, and the marks of nine different makers. Many of them are in the possession of the Hull Trinity House, others are from village churches in the neighbourhood, and one piece of some historical interest is in private hands in Yorkshire. The nine makers’ initials are IC. CW. RR. HR. IB. AB. EM. TH. and KM. They are in shields of very marked shapes, and all hut one of them have some distinguishing emblem, such as a crown, star, or other like addition. With one example of the KM mark, which is of the very end of the seventeenth century, is found a large letter (g like the York letter for 1661-2. Whether this is intended for a date-letter it is impossible to say. A similar letter ^ occurs once with the EM maker’s mark, and a letter has once also been noted. It looks as if for a period of three years or more a date-letter was tried, hut after a very short trial abandoned. The only other circumstance to he observed is that on a piece or two of about 1680 both the [|] mark and the three-crown mark are to he found. This perhaps marks the period of the change from the one mark to the other as that of the Hull local touch. The first two of the makers’ marks given below are to he expected rather with the H than with the crowns, the third and fourth with both these marks, the rest with the three crowns only. The three-crown mark is always struck twice, usually on each side of the maker’s mark. Examples of Hull Plate. 1 Town Marks. Maker’s Mark. Article. H ficj .... Communion cup, dated 1587. — Trinity Ch., Hull. H Do Seal-headed spoons. — Trin. Ho., Hull. H (twice) . #> ' • Communion cup, dated 1638. — St. Mary’s, Hull. H • Do. (twice) Seal-headed spoon, — Trin. Ho,, Hull. CHAP. IV.] Gateshead. 93 Town Marks. Maker’s Mark. Article. H.3 crowns I h* 6 ^ J (twice) Do. . . Do. Do . . Do. 3 crowns (twice). Do. Do. . , Do. Do. . Do. Do. . Do. Do. . Do. Do. . Do. iRRj Do. Do. Do. [ABJ (twice) I IB ' ttwice) Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. . KM as above Do. . I Beaker cup, dated 1621. — Trin. Ho., Hull. Cup and paten, dated 1029. — Nth. Froding- ham, Yorks. Rim, dated 1629, of cocoa-nut cup. — Trin. Ho., Hull. Communion cup, dated 1630. — Hessle, Yorks. Cup and paten, dated 1638. — Burton Pidsea, Yorks, Com. cup. — Preston, near Hedon. Two-handled porringer. — Hon. and Rev. S. Lawley. Communion cup, dated 1666. — Beverley Minster. Paten, dated 1674. — Barnoldby-le-Beck, Yorks. Communion cup, dated 1676. — Kirk Ella, Yorks. Communion cup. — Copgrove, Yorks. Tankard. — Trin. Ho., Hull. Com. cup. — Trin. Ho., Hull. Peg tankard, dated 1689. — Corpn. of Hedon. Tumbler cup, dated 1689. — Trin. Ho., Hull. Communion cup, dated 1695.— Skeffling, Yorks. Tobacco box, dated 1697. —Trin. Ho., Hull. GATESHEAD. A little plate was made and marked in Gateshead at the same period as in Hull. A tankard with flat lid of the later part of the seventeenth century, and a small mug in the possession of the Eight Hon. Sir J. E. Mowbray, Bart., both of which can be traced to a Northumbrian family, have a goat’s head couped in a circle and the initials A\F, also in a circular stamp, both marks twice repeated. The goat’s head was a sort of rebus for the name of the town. It is found on a carved chair of the year 1666 in the vestry of Gateshead church ; and it also occurs on a tradesman’s token of a certain John Bedford, who was one of “ the twenty-four of Gateshead ” in 1658.* Boyne’s Tokens of the Seventeenth Century. 94 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IV. LEEDS. The mark of a pendant lamb, like the badge of the Order of the Golden Fleece, is possibly referable to Leeds. It occurs with a maker’s mark of TB in a heart-shaped shield on a paten at Almondbury Church in Yorkshire, and on a tumbler cup in the author’s possession. It is also found with maker’s mark of ST in linked letters on a shaped escutcheon on a pair of patens, one of which is dated 1702, at Harewood Church in the same county. <&> Paten. — Almondbury, Yorks. Do. Do. Tumbler cup. — W. Cripps, Esq. Do. i Pair of patens, one dated 1702. — Harewood, York; CARLISLE. A single maker of village church plate in the neighbourhood of Carlisle seems to have used a seeded rose as well as his initials. His name was probably Edward Dalton, and his mark is found on small and rudely made communion cups of the early Elizabethan period at Ireby, Bolton, Long Marton, and Cliburn, all in the county of Cumberland. Rude communion cups. — Ireby, Bolton, &c., Cumb. There are two other cups in Cumberland of precisely the same make and fashion in every detail, both dated 1571, but bearing no marks, — one at Uldale and the other at Lazonby. As it is practically certain that, though unmarked, they must be by the same maker as the Ireby cup and the other examples mentioned above bearing the ED mark, the date of the whole group may be considered not to be a matter of any doubt. LINCOLN. A mark usually found alone, and therefore only a maker’s mark, occurs on a number of Elizabethan communion cups in Lincolnshire, and may pretty safely be assigned to a Lincoln craftsman. It is on a specimen of 1569 at Osbournby and of 1570 at Auborn and Upton-cum- Kexby, besides being on undated pieces at Haxey, Boultham, Scotton, Lea near Gainsboro’, Heapham, and Tliimbleby. Communion cup, dated 1569. — Osbournby, Line. Do. dated 1570. — Auborn, Line. Do. Do. Uptcn-cum-Kexby, Line. Do. undated. — Haxey, Boultham. Scotton, &c., Line. CHAP. IV.] Doubtful Provincial Marks. 95 On the two examples of the year 1570, at Auborn and Upton-cum- Kexby respectively, a seven-pointed star, formed of seven small heart- shaped indentations without any shield or escutcheon, is found, as well as the above-mentioned maker’s mark. TAUNTON. A mark of considerable interest is on a spoon pricked with 1678 for date. It consists of a tun or barrel placed across the stem of a large letter T, and no doubt stands for the town of Taunton. It is in the bowl of the spoon, which has TD with a fleur-de-lis under the letters on an escutcheon for maker’s mark on the back of the handle. This spoon is in the collection of Mr. Chichester of Hall. The same marks are found on a beaker in Mr. Staniforth’s collection ; on a paten dated 1676 at Wootton Courtenay in Somersetshire; and on spoons of 1686 and 1691, noted by the Somersetshire Archaeological Society. Do. Paten, dated 1676. — Wootton Courtenay, Som. KING’S LYNN. Two examples of plate are known, marked with the arms of Lynn accompanied by a maker’s mark. This town mark consists of a shield bearing three congers’ heads erect, each with a cross croslet fitche in the mouth ; and it is found on a communion cup at the church of St. Peter, Southgate, Norwich, and on a paten in St. Nicholas’ Chapel, King’s Lynn. SANDWICH. A very peculiar communion cup of tazza form and early sixteenth century date, at St. Mary’s, Sandwich, bears with other marks a lion passant and ship’s hull dimidiated and conjoined, from the town arms. Its date is fixed by the coincidence of its exactly matching a tazza, also used as a chalice, at Wymeswold in Leicestershire, which is hall- marked 1512. These are perhaps all the town marks which can be traced home. DOUBTFUL AND OTHER PROVINCIAL MARKS. There are some few other marks of which nothing certain is at present known. All that can be said is, that as they are found on plate, usually spoons, of apparently English make and of the middle 96 Old English Plate. [chap. IV. of the seventeenth century, the articles bearing them probably escaped more regular marking owing to the social disturbances with which their makers were surrounded. One of the best known of such marks is a fleur-de-lis within a plain, or sometimes headed, circle. It is often found in the bowls of spoons of that date ; examples are in the collections of Mr. Staniforth and Mr. Octavius Morgan. Another is a small and indistinct mark of a circle crossed and re-crossed with lines, some of them running, like the spokes of a wheel, to the centre. This is found in the bowl of a spoon in the collection of Mr. E. Temple Frere, and of one at Cotehele : both of these have a small sitting figure like Buddha, by way of knop, and both have as maker’s mark the letters RC with a five-pointed star between them on the hack of the stems ; a seal- headed spoon also at Cotehele hears the same marks, and 1647 for date pricked upon it. A fourth mark of the same kind is formed of four small hearts arranged with the points inwards, so as to form a sort of quatrefoil. Other such devices and monograms in great variety occur, some- times the same monogram in the howl and on the handle of the spoon, two or even three times repeated in the latter position. Amongst them is occasionally to be recognised the registered mark of some London maker, hut so seldom that in most cases they may safely be said to be of provincial origin, and of about the period we have mentioned. Exceptions may of course be found ; some few are certainly of the earlier part of the same century ; but as a general rule, this class of marks may be referred to the reign of Charles I., or else to the time of the Commonwealth. The most puzzling doubtful mark that has ever come under the author’s notice is on a piece of church-plate at Bradford. It bears a Catherine wheel, and italic h for date-letter, and as maker’s mark the letters ss crowned on a shield repeated twice. It is dated 1691, and is almost certainly of Yorkshire make, for the same set of marks are to be found on plate at Todwick also in Yorkshire, and of the very same year, 1691. The maker’s mark is one of those registered at Gold- smiths’ Hall, but may well belong to a provincial maker for all that ; and as the Catherine wheel occurs on more than one specimen of plate, and in more than one form, it is in all probability the local mark of some northern town. It remains to notice in conclusion another very interesting and perhaps unique mark, though it can hardly be called a doubtful one. CHAP. IV.] Doubtful Provincial Marks . 97 It will be remembered that no provincial offices seem to have had any right to mark plate from 1697 to 1701, and the inconvenience to the trade and the public occasioned by this has already been noticed. It appears, however, that plate made in the provinces between those years is not entirely unknown, as a saltcellar (see engr. chap. X., art Salts), in the form of a lighthouse, formerly amongst the family plate at Tredegar, will show. It bears for goldsmiths’ marks the three words Britan, Rowe, and Plin 0 , each on a plain oblong punch (like the word Radcliff on page 90), and it may be safely attributed to the year 1698, or the early part of 1699. The marks taken together indicate that it was made by one Rowe of Plymouth, of silver of the then new Britannia standard. The piece is not only of considerable historical interest, as will be seen later on, but of great rarity as a specimen of provincial silversmith’s work and marking at a period when but little was made, and none could by proper right be marked, except in London. Two general remarks must here be made upon the subject-matter of this present chapter : one is, that it must not be supposed that there is not plenty of genuine plate, bearing old English provincial marks, to be found in modern collections ; and if the writer has based his remarks chiefly on ancient specimens of church plate, and in other cases upon specimens of which it can safely be said that they have never changed hands at all, it is only that the absolute authenticity of the data relied on may be ensured beyond all possible question. The other remark is a caution that in the case of specimens of provincial make of which the date-letter is doubtful, no help can be obtained from the alphabets of the Goldsmiths’ Company in London. The York and Norwich tables, which will be found in Appendix B., are enough to show that in respect of their date-letters the provincial goldsmiths used different alphabets from those adopted by their metropolitan brethren. They occasionally, in the seventeenth century, sent up their wares to be touched in London, and in that case they seem to have registered the same mark at Goldsmiths’ Hall as that by which they were known to the local assay-wardens. Two such instances, both of goldsmiths in the north of England, and one of a Scottish goldsmith, have come under the writer’s notice. The following table gives a summary, in a form convenient for reference, of all that has been said about ancient provincial English hall marks, and some illustrations of those which are of most impor- tance to the collector of old plate : — H Table op Marks used by the Provincial Assay Towns prior to 1701. 98 Old English Plate . [CHAP. IV. CHAPTER Y. THE PROVINCIAL ASSAY OFFICES AND THEIR MARKS SINCE 1701. THE ACTS OF PARLIAMENT ESTABLISHING THEM — YORK— EXETER— CHESTER — NORWICH — NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE — BIRMINGHAM— SHEFFIELD— TABLE OF MODERN PROVINCIAL MARKS. We come now to the re-establisliment of provincial assay offices in 1701 and 1702 under the circumstances mentioned at an earlier page. The Acts of Parliament* which appointed York, Exeter, Bristol, Chester, Norwich, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne for the assaying and marking of wrought plate may be taken together. They incorporated the goldsmiths and plate-workers of each place under the name of the “ Company of Goldsmiths,” for carrying out their various provisions. No plate was to be made less in fineness than the standard of the kingdom, and the following marks were appointed : — The worker’s mark, to be expressed by the two first letters of his surname, the lion’s head erased, the figure of Britannia and the arms of the city where such plate shall be assayed, and a distinct and variable letter in Roman character, which shall be annually changed upon the election of new wardens to show the year when such plate was made. Every goldsmith and silversmith in each city was required to enter his name, mark, and place of abode with the wardens, and not to stamp plate with any other mark than the mark so entered. The assay- master was to be sworn in before the mayor. It seems almost certain that Bristol t never exercised the power of assaying plate, and Norwich soon abandoned the privilege. The other places named carried the provisions of the Act into effect by establishing assay offices, none of which, however, except that of Chester, still continue in active operation. In 1773, after an enquiry by Parliament into the working of these * 12 & 13 Will. III., cap. 4, York, Exeter, Bristol, Chester, and Norwich. 1 Anne, cap. 9, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. t There are some anomalous marks on a spoon at the Temple Church, Bristol, which might be taken for Bristol hallmarks ; but | the civic archives of the period do not record the establishment of any Goldsmiths’ Com- pany, nor the swearing-in of any assay - master before the mayor, as prescribed in the Act, 2 TOO Old English Plate. [chap. V. offices, Birmingham and Sheffield were appointed for the same purpose ; goods made in these towns haying, as it appeared, until that time, been sent at great inconvenience and expense to Chester or London to be marked. The provisions of the Act appointing them are, speaking generally, much like those by which the older assay offices were regulated, except that the later provisions were more precise and complete, an advantage to be attributed, it is pertinently suggested by Mr. Byland in his Assay of Gold and Silver Wares, to the opposition of the Goldsmiths’ Company in London, which was a little jealous of rival offices. Out of this wholesome rivalry arose the parliamentary inquiry and report, without which the statute establish- ing the offices at Sheffield and Birmingham would have been far less complete and satisfactory. A few words must be said about each of the provincial offices in turn, except Bristol, which may be considered to be disposed of ; premising that the later general Acts of the last and present century, regulating the goldsmith’s trade, and noticed in the last chapter, apply to all offices alike. YORK. This office has had a somewhat fitful existence. Be-established in 1701, it is mentioned with the rest in the Acts of 1739 and of 1784, although it was certainly not working at the time of the parliamen- tary inquiry of 1773. Probably the company was stirred up by it a little, and started work again in 1774 with a new alphabet. Certainly at the commencement of the present century its operations were more regular, and there is a record in existence of the work done from 1805 O ' — 1821.* From this it appears that duty to the amount of about i£300 a-year was paid through the York office for work sent to be assayed by some four or five silversmiths ; the articles made by them consisting of household plate, now and then some articles of Com- munion plate for a York church, and some wedding-rings ; “a coffin plate ” is mentioned more than once. Later on, in 1848, it is again to be heard of, but working as before on a very small scale. A return then obtained shows it to have assayed on an average no more than 2,000 ounces of silver, besides an insignificant quantity of gold in the five preceding years ; and in 1856 the office had practically ceased to exist. The annual date-letter seems to have been changed more or less regularly from 1800, and perhaps earlier, nearly down to the time of the discontinuance of the office, but owing to the loss of its books * One of the register-booka of the Assay j Raine, who has kindly furnished the follow* Office is now in the possession of Canon | ing notes from it. CHAP. V.] Modern York . ioi and the small quantity of work done, it is hopeless to attempt any complete list of the letters used in the previous century. An alphabet of Roman capitals seems to have been commenced about 1774, and to have been continued for some ten letters, but from 1787 a new alphabet of Roman small letters is found running till we come to Roman capital M for 1798. Then follow capitals in order. A letter J is found with the York arms and the incused King’s Head, and seems to fit in pretty well with other pieces of known date. From the M of 1798, the tables given in the Appendix are certainly correct. The distinguishing mark of the York office was a shield of the arms of the city, which are five lions passant on a cross. (See Table, p. 114.) The usual Britannia standard marks and perhaps Roman capitals for date-letters were used from 1701 to 1720, but a court-hand letter I appears on a communion cup at Hawkswell, Yorkshire, which bears 1714 as its engraved date ; and the same letter is found on an undated tumbler-cup in the author’s possession. Both these pieces have for maker’s mark LA in a shield with escalloped top. Afterwards, from the time of the restoration of the old sterling standard for silver in the latter year until about 1847, York, like some of the other provincial assay towns, used the leopard’s head, but without any very good reason after 1789, though the practice is defensible until then accord- ing to the wording of the Act which restored the old standard. A well-known legal authority characterises the addition of the leopard’s head mark in these cases as an unnecessary incumbrance ;* and from 1789 this is clearly the case. The Act of 1720 restoring the old sterling standard with its proper marks says nothing about the provincial offices, which accordingly adopted the ordinary London marks; but in 1789 these matters were further regulated by 12 Geo. II. c. 26, and standard gold and old sterling silver were to be marked “ as folio weth (that is to say) with the mark of the maker or worker thereof, which shall be the first letter of his Christian and surname, and with the marks of the Company of Goldsmiths in London, viz., the leopard’s head, the lion passant, and a distinct variable mark or letter to denote the year in which the plate was made ; or with the mark of the worker or maker, and with the marks appointed to be used by the assayers at York, Exeter, Bristol, Chester, Norwich, or New- castle-on-Tyne.” A reference to the Acts of Will. III. and Anne shows the marks so appointed to be the arms of the cities, and a Variable mark or letter, which from 1720 should properly have been used, in conjunction with the mark of the maker. * Tilsley’s & 'tamp Lawi. 102 Old English Plate. [chap. y. The names of the York goldsmiths which can be traced in the early part of the eighteenth century are as follows : — Daniel Turner, free 1700, died 1704. Joseph Buckle, free 1715, died 1761. John, son of Marmaduke Best, free 1694. William, son of John Williamson, free 1694. Clement Reed, free 1698. John Morrett, jeweller, free 1721. Thos. Parker, silversmith, son of Edward Parker, free 1721. Wm. Hudson, silversmith. John Bentley, silversmith, 1725. John Busfield, goldsmith, son of Wm. Busfield, goldsmith, free 1727. Jonathan Atkinson, goldsmith, 1735. The above-named Joseph Buckle, John Busfield, and William Hudson, together with a Stephen Buckle, are all who voted as gold- smiths according to poll-books of 1741. Goldsmiths are found voting also in 1758, amongst them Stephen Buckle again. In 1774 John Prince of Coney Street appears with others. Several names occur in 1758, 1774, and 1784 ; but few or any of them were working goldsmiths, though two or three were watchmakers. Examples of Modebx Yoek Plate. Inscribed Date. Date- Letter. Maker’s Mark. Article. 1702 ® ] Probaby John Racing cup, inscribed “ Maggot on Kip- 1 Best, 1694. lingcotes, 1702.” — Rise Park, Hull. 1705 < ft* - } Probably Wm. 2*0 Busfield, Cup and paten, dated 1705. — St. Michael’s, Malton, Yorks. 1679. 1714 © |l $ Communion cup, dated 1714, — Hawkes- well, Yorks. N. D. Do. Do. . . . Tumbler-cup. — W. Cripps, Esq. X. D. Do. 1 Probably Wm. Williamson, Communion cup. — Kirkby Ravensworth, Yorks. 1694. 1777 | None. I-H Hampston Communion cup, dated 1777. — Selby I-P and Prince. Abbey, Yorks. 1780 (f! Do. . Flagons, dated 1780. — All Saints’, North Street, York. X. D. Do. Do. Communion cup and salver. — Burnsall, Yorks. 1780 © Do. . Paten, dated 1780. — All Saints, North Street, York. Communion cup and cover. — St. Michael- X.D. Do. Do. le-Belfry, York. 1780 © Do. . Paten, dated 1780. — Kirk Burton, Yorks. 1784 Do. Do. Communion cup, dated 1784. — Hunting- ton, Yorks. X. D. Do. Do. . Paten, given by Mary Lady Goodricke. — Hunsigore, Yorks. ' ? 1785 iD [ H+P ] Communion cup. — Holme-on- Spalding Moor, Yorks. This piece bears the in- cused King’s Head mark. e»AP. v.] Modern Exeter. 10 Inscribed ! Date- Date. Letter. Makers Mark. Article. 1791 ! @ < 8 > Hampston and Prince. Flagon, dated 1791. — St. John’s, Ouse- bridge, York. 1792 © Do. Flagon, dated 1792. — Kirk Deighton, Yorks. N. D. @ Do. . Communion cup. — Askham Bryan, Yorks. 179S ® [HP] l&Col H. Prince and Co. ! Flagon, dated 1798. — Warter, Yorks. 1 EXETER. This city availed itself forthwith of the powers conferred upon it in 1701, and its office has continued its work until recently. Eleven gold- smiths met on August 7tli, 1701, and proceeded to elect William Ekins and Daniel Slade as their first wardens. Steps were taken to procure a convenient house for an assay office, resolutions for its management passed, and punches for marking plate ordered in November, one Edward Richards having been appointed assay-master in the preceding month, an office which he seems to have held till January, 1707-8. Early in the following year such goldsmiths of Devon, Cornwall, Somerset, and Dorset, as had not yet entered their marks, were notified that the office was ready to assay plate according to the Act of Parliament. The distinguishing mark of the office is a castle of three towers. At first the mark used was a somewhat bold one : the two outer towers, which are lower in the shield than the central one, are bent inwards towards it, and the shield is shaped ; but after 1709, or thereabouts, the shield was reduced in size, and was made of the ordinary plain angular heraldic pattern, with the towers smaller and upright. In the case of both the shields there is what might be taken for a small flaw running from the central tower to the bottom of the shield ; this in reality denotes the partition per pale of the field on which the triple castle of the city of Exeter is borne. (See Table, p. 114.) The minutes of the year 1710 give the first actual mention of the alphabetical date- letter, which was for that year k ; we may say, therefore, that the first alphabet used was one of Roman capitals, and commenced on Michaelmas Day, 1701, in which year the observance of the Act became obligatory. The letters a and n are found in ornamental or shaped shields. Later on the letter was changed on August 7th. It will be seen from the table given at the end of this c.>. Old English Plate . [chap. v. 104 volume that Eoman letters, capital or small, were used until the commencement of an alphabet of old English capitals in 1837 ; we shall also notice that since 1797 the same letters have been used as at the Goldsmiths’ Hall in London. This table shows them just as they are written in the minute-book, which is the safest course to adopt, even though printed letters may not he exact facsimiles in all cases of the punches used. The letters for the present century, and perhaps a longer period, have been in square shields with the corners slightly cut off, or sometimes with the upper corners of the shield cut off and the lower end rounded, as best suited the letter enclosed. The early makers’ marks were, in compliance with the Act, the first two letters of the surname ; hut, most unfortunately, a leaf is now missing from the Company’s record-hook which contained the first twenty-three entries. The earliest of those left is the twenty-fourth, entered on Nov. 18th, 1703, and is that of “ Mr. Peeter Eliot of Dartmouth,” whose mark was to he EL. Other marks follow at the rate of one or two in each year, entered by goldsmiths residing at Launceston, Plymouth, Dunster, Truro, and other places as well as Exeter, some examples of which may be given, viz. : — * m H << Ui a A j <1 1703 EL Do. Do. 1704 Wj Do. •etc HO Do. Do. VA 1705 Ca. Do. St Do. Do. © Do. (pl) Name. Peeter Eliot, of Dartmouth. Jacob Tyth, of Launceston. Mary Ashe, of Launceston. Richard Wilcocks, of Ply- mouth. Mr. Richard Holin,of Truro. Edward Sweet, of Dunster. Richard Vavasor, of Tottoness, Robert Catkitt, Exon. James Strong, Exon. John Manby, Dartmouth. Thos. Reynolds, Exon. Richard Plint, Truro. Date. Marks. Name. 11705 (^Ca) Thos. Haysham, Bridgewater. 1706 M Thos. Sampson, Exon. 1 Do - y. ! +3 OQ P 2 I © w g w-S OQ “ 3 g ?-t • c3 c3 © © © > „ 2 5 $g i— > 1-1 "cJD ® © ^ > ©2 §-§ © © 3-2 o3 £3 ” § i 2 CHAPTER YI. SCOTLAND. SCOTCH LEGISLATION — THE EDINBURGH GOLDSMITHS — THEIR MARKS, DEACONS, AND ASSAY-MASTERS — OLD PROVINCIAL MARKS — MODERN GLASGOW — TABLE OF EDINBURGH AND GLASGOW MARKS. In Scotland attention was paid at an early period to the fineness of wrought gold and silver, and steps were taken by the Legislature to prevent frauds in the working of those metals. For in the reign of King James II., a.d. 1457* a statute was passed by the parliament of Scotland, enacting that “ anent the reformation of gold and silver wrocht be Goldsmithes, and to eschew the deceiving done to the kingis lieges, there sail be ordained in ilk burgh, quhair Goldsmithes workis ane understandard, and a cunning man of gude conscience quliilk sail be Deakone of the craft. And quhen the warke is brocht to the goldsmithe and it be gold, what gold that beis brocht till him he sail give it foorth again in warke na war nor xx grains, and silver xi grains fme.*f" And the said Goldsmith sail take his warke or he give it foorth and passe to the deakone of the craft and gar him examine that it be sa fine as before written. And the said deakone sail set his marke and taken thereto togidder with the said Goldsmithes. And gif faulte be founden therein afterwards, the deakone aforesaid and Goldsmithes gudes sail be in escheit to the King, and their lives at the kingis will and the said deakone sail have to his fee of ilk ounce wrocht an penny. And quhair there is no Goldsmithes hot ane in a towne, he sail shew that warke takened with his awin marke to the head officiates of the towne quhilkis sail have a marke in like maner ordained therefore and sail be set to the said warke. And quhat Goldsmith that givis foorth his warke utherwaies then is before written his gudes sail be confiscat to the King and his * Fourteenth Parliament, VI. of March, f That is : 20 grains or parts of fine gold 1457. 65. Of the Deakon of Goldsmithes ; in 24 ; 11 of pure silver in 12, and of the marking of their warke. CHAT. VI.] Scotland. 117 life at the Kingis will.” We have thus early, therefore, a maker’s mark established, and in addition to it, a deacon’s mark in towns where goldsmiths are established, or a town mark in places where hut a single goldsmith resides. In 1483 the thirteenth parliament* of the next reign, that of James III., further ordains as follows : “ that for the eschewing of the great damnage and skaithes that our Sovereign Lordis lieges sustein be the goldsmithes in the minishing the fines of the silver warke that fra thine furth there be in ilk burgh of the realm quhair goldsmithes ar, ane deakon and ane searcliour of the craft. And that ilk goldsmithes warke he marked with his awin marke, the deakone’s marke and the marke of the Towne of the finesse of twelve-penny fine. And quhair there is ony sik warke within the said finesse, the warke to be broken the workman to upmake the avail of the finesse aforesaid, and the said workman to he punished therefore at the King’s will.” It further provides that no goldsmith be a master, nor hold open booth unless he he admitted by the officers of the craft and the whole body of it. This same year we come to the grant by the Town Council of Edinburgh, of certain privileges to the goldsmiths and members of some other trades, all being included under the name of “Hammer- men,” in answer to a petition in which they complained of infractions upon the “ auld gude rule ” of their craft. Next follows, in 1489, another statute,! to the same effect as the earlier ones, providing “ that ilk goldsmith have ane special marke, signe and taiken to be put in his said warke quihilk he makis. And they samin warkes to he of fines of the new warkes of silver of Bruges. And that there he ane deakon of the craft of goldsmithes quihilk sail examine the said warke and fines thereof and see that it he als gude as the said wark of Bruges. And thereafter the samin deakon to put his marke and signe on the said warke, and to answer thereupon his life and gudes. And as touching the warke of gold, that it he maid als fine as it is first molten in the presence of the awner, like as the touch and assaie given to him quhen it is first molten.” In 1555, an Act \ to regulate “ the finesse of goldsmith’s warke and the marke thereof” proceeds: — “Forasmuch as there is great fraud and hurt done unto the lieges of the realm by goldsmiths that make silver and gold of no certain finesse but at their pleasure, by * XXIV. Feb., 1483. 96. Of Gold- I Feb., 1489. 13. Of Goldsmithes. smiths. % Mary, Sixth Parliament, XX, June, + James IV. Second Parliament, XV. j 1555. Old English Plate . [uiiAr. vi. ii 8 which there is some silver warke set furth of such baseness of alloy, viz., of six and seven penny fine against the public weal of the realm, it is ordained that na goldsmith make in warke nor set foortli either of his a win or uther mennis silver under the just finance of elleven pennie fine under the paine of death and confiscation of all their gudes moveable. And that everie goldsmith marke the silver warke that he makis with his awin marke and with the townis marke And als that na goldsmith make in warke or set furth of his awin or uther mennis gold under the just finesse of twentie twa carat fine under the pains aforesaid.” Then come letters-patent of King James VI., granted in 1586, and ratified by parliament in the following year, to the deacon and masters of the Goldsmiths’ craft in Edinburgh, which gave further effect to these statutes by empowering that body to search for gold and silver work, and to try whether it were of the fineness required by law and to seize all that should appear deficient : this gave them a monopoly of their trade and the entire regulation of it, separating them finally from all association with the “hammermen” or common smiths. The working rules of the craft received in 1591 the ratification of the Town Council ; but they contain no further mention of marks to he used. We may remark that George Heriot, a name so well known in the mystery, was “ deykin ” of the goldsmiths in Edinburgh that same year. This most distinguished of all the Scotch goldsmiths was born in 1568, and was eldest son of another George Heriot, who belonged to the company of goldsmiths in Edinburgh. The younger Heriot has already been mentioned ; but it may be interesting to note in this chapter that his father, who died in 1610, was also a man of eminence, having been a commissioner in the convention of estates and parliament of Scotland, and a convener of the trades of Edinburgh at five different elections of the council.* Lastly, the Charter of Incor- poration of the Goldsmiths of Edinburgh, granted by James VII., in 1687, confirms their previous privileges, and extends their powers over the whole kingdom of Scotland. It seems clear that at this time but little plate, and henceforward none at all, was assayed, except in Edinburgh, until the establish- ment of the office at Glasgow in the present century. In earlier times several towns used marks in compliance with the early Acts of Parliament, but few instances of plate bearing them are now to be ound : such as there are will be noted presently. The earliest marks, therefore, were the maker’s and deacon’s punches Hone’s Every Day Book , ii., 747. CHAP. VI.] Edinburgh. 119 only, to which the mark of the town is added in 1483 ; though we must not forget, as a piece of antiquarian information, the mention of a town mark as early as the Act of 1457. The introduction of a variable date -letter seems nearly coincident with the granting of the charter of James VII., the first mention of it being in Sept. 1681, when a small black letter a was adopted as the letter for the ensuing year. It has been changed regularly ever since on the first hall-day in October. In the Goldsmiths’ books, there is a wonderfully consecutive record of the date-letters used from that time forward, but no note of the shape of the shields surrounding them, except for impressions from the actual punches used in the earliest cycle, which are struck upon the pages containing the minutes. A new and carefully corrected Table was prepared expressly for this volume, by the late Mr. James H. Sanderson, well known as one of the best authorities on the subject of Scotch plate, and time has only proved its complete accuracy. The extensive MS. collections made by this painstaking antiquary containing much valuable information as to provincial marks in Scotland, and biographical notes of the deacons with their marks have passed into the possession of the present writer. We have now enumerated four of the marks to be found on plate assayed in Edinburgh, — the maker’s, the deacon’s, the castle, and the date-letter. Two others have to be mentioned, one an alteration, and the other an addition. In 1759, the deacon’s mark was abolished, the standard mark of a thistle being substituted for it ; and in 1784, as in England, the Sovereign’s head was ordained as a duty mark. Returning to the course of legislation there is nothing to notice, and the old laws seem to have remained in force, until the date of the general enactment* which now, to quote from its title, fixes the standard qualities of gold and silver plate in Scotland, and provides for the marking and assaying thereof. Its provisions much resemble those of the Acts establishing the more modern of the English provincial assay offices, except as regards the standard and the city mark. It prohibits the sale not only of plate manufactured in Scot- land, but of any plate without the marks of one of the Scotch assay offices, so that no plate made in London or elsewhere out of Scotland can be sold in Scotland, unless it be re- assayed and stamped at the Edinburgh or Glasgow offices. Of the Glasgow office, established in 1819, presently. <5 & 7 Will, IV. c. 69. 120 Old English Plate . ["chap. vi. The Act recapitulates the marks to be used, and they are as follows : — For gold of 22 carats, the five stamps of which mention has been made — the maker’s initials, the town, the standard, the duty, and date marks. For gold of 18 carats, the same, with the additional stamp of the figures 18. For silver of the old standard, the same stamps as for gold of 22 carats. For silver of the new standard, the same stamps, with the additional mark of Britannia. It may be remarked that the higher standard silver has been but little used in Scotland. To sum up in chronological form, the Edinburgh marks are : — 1. Maker’s mark, from 1457. 2. Standard mark, being deacon’s initials from 1457 to 1759 when the thistle was substituted for it. 8. The town mark of a castle, from 1483. 4. The date-letter, from 1681-2. 5. The duty mark of the Sovereign’s head, from 1784, as in England. We now propose to give a few of the more interesting examples of Edinburgh hall-marks, from 1618 to 1778, with short notices of the makers, deacons, and assay- masters of that period. The marks are numbered so as to correspond with the biographical notes which belong to, and follow them ; and it must here be noted that after the year 1633, there is a blank in the records for nearly forty years, which renders it a matter of difficulty to identify the names of the makers with their respective marks. It also appears that unless the deacon was popular with the craftsmen, he did not get elected to serve a second year. The maker’s mark is as a rule found on the left of the Edinburgh mark, and the deacon’s or assay-master’s mark on the right of it. CHAP. VI.] Edinburgh. I 2 I 1. — 1618. Gilbert Kirkland. 2. — 1628. George Robertson. 3. — 1633. Trinity College Church plate. 4. — 1633. George Crawford. 5. — 1642. Tolbooth Church plate, Edinburgh. 6. — 1650. Currie Church plate, near Edinburgh. 7.— 1657. Dunbar Church plate. 8.— 1677. Alexander Reed. 9.— 1692. Robt. Ingles. 10.— 1699. Dunblane Church plate. 11.— 1717. Patrick Turnbull. 12.— 1728. Wm. Ay ton. 13. — 1735. James Kerr. 14. — 1746. Edward Lothian and Hugh Gordon. 15.-1760. Robt. Gordon. 16.— 1778. Patrick Robertson. 122 [CHAr. VI. Old English Plate . 1. Gilbert Kirldancl was deacon of the Goldsmiths’ Craft in the year 1628-4, and again in 1636. He made the Fyvie parish com- munion plate (Aberdeenshire) in the year 1618, and that of the parish of Marnock in 1636 ; we have his punch four times between those dates. The deacon’s mark PL occurs three times, between 1618 and 1640 ; his name unknown. 2. George Robertson was master of the Cuinziehous (coining-house) and made the Mace belonging to the city of Edinburgh in the year 1617. Between that date and 1629 we have his punch 3 times, as the maker of church -plate. The deacon G, name unknown. We find his punch on church- plate nine times between 1617 and 1638. It appears on the Edin- burgh Mace, just mentioned, of 1617 ; see also the following example. 3. Maker’s name unknown, but is found on several examples in 1633, including the plate in the Tron Church and the Torgue Church. The deacon’s mark is the same as in the preceding instance ; it is perhaps the mark as deacon of George Crawford, he being deacon in 1633. 4. George Crawford was deacon of the craft in the year 1622, and again in 1633 ; we have his punch as G‘C three times on church- plate, from 1646 to 1650. He made a cup for Newbattle Church in 1646, and some old Grey Eriars Church plate in 1649. The deacon’s monogram we have five times between 1629 and 1646, name unknown ; it occurs on the Dunfermline plate in 1629, on the Haddington Church plate in 1646, and in connection with the mark of George Bobertson on an alms-dish now at St. Patrick’s Church, Brighton, but formerly the property of the church of Duffus, co. Elgin. 5. From the Tolbooth parish communion plate (Edinburgh). The maker PB crowned. We have this punch four times between the years 1640, when it occurs on the Dalkeith Church plate, and 1662, when it appears both as maker’s and deacon’s mark, being struck twice on the same piece. The deacon’s punch we have seven times between 1640 and 1650. It occurs with the same maker’s mark on the Dalkeith plate and with a different maker’s mark on that of the High Church, Edinburgh, of 1643. Both maker’s and deacon’s name unknown. 6. From the Currie parish communion plate, believed to be of 1650, both maker’s and deacon’s name unknown. chap, vi.] . Edinburgh . 123 7. Dunbar parish communion plate, maker’s punch known from 1644 to 1657. Deacon’s punch known only for two years from 1657 ; both names unknown. 8. Alexander Reed (with a crown over his initials) was deacon of the craft in 1677-8, and made, at that time, some of the Pittenweem parish church plate (in Fifeshire). His mark is found 1670 to 1677, — in 1670, as both maker and deacon, and again as deacon in 1674. The deacon’s initials, also crowned ; we have his punch, usually as a maker, five times between the years 1667 and 1681 ; his name unknown. 9. Robert Ingles was deacon of the craft in 1691, and again in 1701 ; we have his punch seven times, as a maker, between the years 1692 and 1719. It is on communion plate at Cromdale, in Moray-' shire, given in 1708. This has the Edinburgh letter for 1707-8, and the assay-master’s mark is the italic P , which appears as maker’s mark on the following example. The deacon’s, or rather in this case and henceforwards, the assay- master’s, mark is S3 in a shaped border ; we have his punch twenty times between the years 1681 and 1700. From 1681 a date-letter appears. 10. From Dunblane parish church communion plate. Maker’s name unknown. He appears as a maker five times between the years 1685 and 1695, and as assay-master sixteen times from 1700 to 1707, besides once in 1698, and again in 1698. For the assay-master see No. 9 as above. 11. Patrick Turnbull , who was maker and deacon of the craft in that year, as found on the Legerwood parish church communion plate. 12. William Ayton , who was deacon of the craft in the year 1730-1. We have his punch four times between the years 1729 and 1733. The assay-master EP seems to have held that office from 1708 to 1729. During that period we have his punch six times as a maker, and twenty-four times as assay-master ; his name unknown. 13. James Kerr was deacon of the craft three times, and for two years at each time, in the years 1734-5, 1746-7, and in 1750-1. He was also a Member of Parliament ; we have his punch six times between the years 1723 and 1735. The mark AU appears as that of the assay-master from 1729 to 1737. During that period we have his punch twelve times as such. From 1737 to 1746 it is uncertain who was assay-master, but Edward Lothian certainly was in 1743 and 1744. 124 Old English Plate. [chap. ti. 14. Edward Lothian was deacon of the craft in the years 1742-3, and from the Hammermen’s Arms (a hammer with Imperial Crown) which the device over his initials is intended to represent, he had been a member of that corporation ; we have his punch both a$ maker and deacon, in all five times, from 1744 to 1760, and then with the standard mark (the thistle) introduced in 1759, instead of the deacon’s or assay-master’s mark, as in the next example. The assay-master, Hugh Gordon , was deacon of the craft in 1732-3, and seems to have been in office as assay-master 1746 to 1756. During that period we have his punch sixteen times. 15. Robert Gordon , with his initials crowned, was deacon of the craft in 1748-9 ; we have his punch three times between the years 1744 and 1760. The Castle and Thistle, in square punches, differ a little at this date from the same marks as used a few years later. 16. Patrick Robertson was deacon of the craft in the year 1754-5, and again in 1764-5; being two years in office each time; we find his punch fourteen times as maker between the years 1766 and 1790. Examples of Edinbukgh Plate, With Makers’ Marks and the Assay-Master’s Mark till its discontinuance in 1759. 1682 E © (Thomas Cleghorn.) Jug. — The late Lord Murray. Do. H Do. Duddingston Church plate, dated 1682. Do. M-tPl (AL) Do. Baptismal basin. — Tron Church, Edinburgh. 1685 (f Do. (Thomas Cleghorn, see 1682.) Auchtermuchtie com- munion cups, dated 1686. 1689 Do. Do. (Do.) Benholm Church plate, dated 1690. 1690 m (Patrick Robertson.) Cake-basket.— Messrs. Mackay and Chisholm. : 1770 Do. (Do.) Spoon. — Capt. Gordon, of Cluny, 1771 [p|wj (John Welsh.) Plain bowl. — Castle Grant. 1776 (William Davies.) Oxnam Church plate, dated 1776. 1777 PR (Patrick Robertson, as in 1766.) Mauchline Church plate, dated 1777. 1788 WD (William Davies, as in 1776.) Cramond Church plate. 1784: w\ (James Hewet.) St. Andrew’s (Edinburgh) Church plate. 1785 in (Francis Howden.) Leecroft (Bridge of Allan) Church plate. 1788 PR (Patrick Robertson, as in 1766.) Mauchline baptismal basin. 1789 Do. (Do.) Pencaitland Church plate, given 1789. 1790 Do. (Do.) Kippen Church plate, given 1790. Do. m Carmylie Church plate, given 1791. I 1791 wc (William and Peter ) Tolbooth Church baptismal basin, re- PC Cunningham.) \ newed 1792. 1795 [wr] (William Robertson.) Westerkirk Church plate. 1 1799 FH 1 (Francis Howden, as in 1785.) Kincardine Church plate, 1 1 i dated 1799. Before coming to the establishment of the modern assay office of Glasgow, we must pause to notice six provincial towns in Scotland, where plate was marked in olden times. These, and possibly other towns, availed themselves of the privileges conferred by the Act of 1457, the provisions of which in this behalf will be remembered. It is certain that these provisions were not very strictly attended to, for in many cases the mark of the assay-master’s tool is the only proof that the metal had been examined and tested by any authorised person ; the maker’s and the town mark . being found unaccompanied by a deacon’s. The following marks have been selected as illustrations of the mode of marking plate in the Scotch provincial towns ; and an explanatory note of each is added to conclude this section of the subject. CHAP. VI.] Scotch Provincial Marks , 127 Glasgow, 1703. Renfrew Church plate. Glasgow, 1708. Greenock, West Church plate. Glasgow, 1765. St. Quivox Church plate, Ayr. Dundee, 1665. Dundee parish church, alms-dish. Also St. Yigean’s, dated 1667. Dundee, 1652. Forgan Church plate, Fife. Aberdeen, 1650. (Walter Melville), King’s College Mace. PW4 BBlXXI Aberdeen, 1666. Ellon Church plate, Aberdeenshire. Aberdeen or Montrose, 1682. (William Lumsden), Fordown Church plate. Kincardineshire. Inverness, 1810, (Charles Jamison.) Perth, 1771. The West Church, Perth. St. Andrew’s, 1671. The parish church plate, St. Andrew’s. 128 Old English Plate . [CHAP. VI. In Glasgow the old town mark was the arms, with the bell on one side of the tree, a letter G on the other, the fish’s head is sometimes to the dexter, and sometimes to the sinister side, and has a ring in its month : of this mark we have above twenty examples between the years 1694 and 1766. On early plate the town mark is on a small round punch, so small that it is often difficult to recognise the bearings at all. In most examples we have a date-letter, but it is impossible to place them in regular order. It seems probable, that the letters used at the end of the seventeenth, and beginning of the following, century were of the same character as those of the first two Edinburgh alphabets, and that the same letters stood for nearly the same years at both places. The Glasgow letters seem to occur about three years later than the corresponding letter at Edinburgh, thus the small Gothic 0 for 1694 at Edinburgh would be for 1697 at Glasgow. In Dundee also the town mark was the arms, a pot of three grow- ing lilies, of which we have only a few examples. The shape of the flowers is not always quite the same. One of those given is of the year 1652, and has the date-letter (in octagonal border); the other is on a large circular alms-dish of 1665, with the coat of arms of the donor, Johannes Fethens. The RG of 1652 is also found on a cup belonging to the Church of Perth, said to have been given by Mary, Queen of Scots, and repaired in Dundee in 1687. The original part of the cup is of beautiful Nuremberg work. AL in a square, repeated twice, appears on the communion cups at Kettins, Coupar Angus, which are dated 1686. In Aberdeen , the town mark was a contraction BD or ABD. The first Aberdeen mark on the preceding page gives it as it appears on the Mace of the King’s College, which is marked with the maker’s name, Waltervs Melville Facet , 1650 ; the XX may be the quality of the silver. In most cases the town mark is as in the next example of 1666, though the contraction mark is not always found. The example of 1682 gives the mark of one William Lumsden , with his initials, hammer and crown ; the probability is that he belonged to the Hammer- men’s Society. The rose not unfrequently appears on each side of his initials: this mark we have often seen on plate of about the year 1680, wdien this Lumsden is w^ell known to have worked as a jeweller in Aberdeen. The was used in script letters in the eighteenth century. It so occurs at Dyce in 1770, and at Birnie in 1778. The Inverness town mark was, like that of Aberdeen, a contraction INS, but has no mark over these initials, It is found on a commu- CHAP. VI.] Glasgow . 129 nion cup given in 1708 b} T a Lady Grant to Inverallan (Grantown) Churcli, Morayshire. It has a maker’s mark [Mj] on each side of it, and the remains of a Roman letter C in a plain shield. This, it may be noted, is also the Edinburgh letter for 1707-8, so perhaps at that time Inverness used the same letters as the capital. A more modern maker’s mark met with is that of Charles Jamison, who was in busi- ness there about the year 1810. Besides his initials there is an animal (very small) something like a dromedary, which happens to be the dexter supporter of the Inverness arms. The animal is found usually turned to the left, but sometimes to the right. The Perth town mark was a spread eagle, sometimes single and sometimes double-headed, part of the town arms, and was used along with the Edinburgh marks, as shown on the West Church communion plate. The double eagle with [RK] (Robert Kay) is found on spoons of modern date. It should be mentioned that the mark of a lamb and flag for Perth, with [RG] for maker’s mark, occurs on the com- munion cups of Coupar Angus, which are dated 1687. The St. Andrew's town mark was a St. Andrew’s cross, as shown on the parish church communion plate ; the same marks occur on a silver dish, thought to be a salt-cellar, belonging to St. Mary’s College there. GLASGOW. Lastly, we come to the establishment of a new assay office in Glasgow, by an Act of 1819 (59 Geo. III. c. 28), which formed a company in that city whose powers should extend for forty miles round, and appoints the marks to be used by it. These marks have been used ever since, notwithstanding any references to Glasgow in the more general Act 6 & 7 Will. IV. The distinguishing mark was to be the arms of the city of Glasgow, — a tree, fish, and bell ; and its date-letters, complete alphabets of twenty-six letters each, have been regularly changed. It is proposed for the future to use twenty- five letters only, in order that the cycles shall each comprise a quarter of a century. The standard mark is the lion rampant : these three, together with the maker’s mark and Sovereign’s head, make up the set of marks used there. For silver of the higher standard, the “ Britannia” mark is, how- ever, added, and gold of eighteen carats is marked with the figures 18. The special remark must be made, that as the marks for gold of twenty- two carats have been, until quite lately, the same as those used for K [chap. VI. 130 Old English Plate . sterling silver, an article made of sterling silver stamped as such and afterwards gilt often cannot, by the marks alone, be distinguished from gold. The figures 22 seem to be now used on gold of this quality. The Parliamentary enquiry of 1778 did not extend to Scotland; but in 1848, both Edinburgh and Glasgow were in fair work, the former doing somewhat more than the latter. Edinburgh in 1847 had stamped nearly 29,000 ounces, and paid to the government a sum of 502,152. Table of Marks used in Edinburgh and Glasgow. For gold of 18 carats since 6 & 7 Will. IV., and quite recently of 22 carats, add those figures respectively to the marks for silver, O.S. For gold of the three lower standards, the quality is marked for 15, 12, or 9 carats, with those figures, in addition to the marks for silver, O.S. CHAPTER VII. IRELAND. THE GOLDSMITHS’ COMPANY OF DUBLIN — CORK — NEW GENEVA— TABLE OF DUBLIN MARKS. The Goldsmiths’ Company of Dublin, incorporated by a charter from Charles I., dated 1688 (22 Dec., 18 Car. I.), has the entire regula- tion of the goldsmiths’ trade in Ireland. Their charter is given at full length by Mr. Hyland in the little hook before alluded to,* from which some of the following details relating to it have been taken. The company was to have the correction of all abuses within the kingdom of Ireland, and to exercise the same powers as the Gold- smiths’ Company of London had in England. The incorporated members were, William Cooke, John Woodcocke, William Hampton, James Vanderbegg, William Gallant, John Banister, Nathaniel Houghton, James Acheson, Clement Evans, George Gallant, Sylvanus Glegg, William St. Cleere, Gilbert Tongues, Edward Shadesy, Peter Vanemhown, Matthew Thomas, William Crawley, Thomas Duffield, John Cooke and John Burke, all styled of the city of Dublin, gold- smiths ; and the above-named William Cooke, John Woodcocke, William Hampton, and John Banister were appointed the first wardens. Their successors and future wardens were to take office on All Saints’ Day. No gold or silver of less fineness than the standard in England was to he wrought, and “the King’s Majesty’s stamp called the Harp crowned now appointed by his said Majesty ” was not to he put on any silver below his Majesty’s standard. These privileges have been exercised to the present time, subject to the various subsequent Acts of Parliament which are presently to he noticed ; and the hooks of the company have been kept with regularity even through troublous times. The early entries occasionally give the annual date -letters, as in 1644 and some succeed- ing years, but this is not often the case. Notices of civic importance are not wanting, such as the riding of the franchises of the city of Dublin, in which the Company of Gold- * Assay of Gold and Silver Wares , London, 1852. 1 3 2 Old English Plate. [chap. VII. smiths took a prominent part in 1649, and other years. In that year, we have a detailed account of the attendance of the company with horse and armour, and after the names of those who bore their part in the cavalcade, including Gilbert Tongues as captain, and also a Captain Waterhouse, comes a note which serves to indicate that the goldsmiths were of no mean importance socially speaking, for it adds, “ certain above-named were not of our corporation, hut of their own goodness forsook more ancient corporations and rode as loving brothers in our company, viz., Captain Waterhouse; some were invited by Mr. Sheriff Vandyndhowm to his tent, the rest with us at Mr. Sumynour, having no tent in the field.” The minute of this event ends with the words “ Sic transit gloria liodiei.” Another such festivity is recorded in 1656 ; but later on the times seem changed, for we come upon a motion in 1776 resolving that the company was incapable of riding the franchises that year. It was not unmindful of its duty of prosecuting the fraudulent, for in 1777 it is entered that one Michael Keating, whose mark was MK, was convicted of counterfeiting marks, and sentenced to a fine of 50 l. and six months’ imprisonment “ at the last commission of Oyer and Terminer.” A company of goldsmiths existed also at Cork, and regularly elected its master and wardens each year, at all events from the middle of the seventeenth century for some seventy-five years. The Cork gold- smiths marked their plate with a galleon and a castle with a flagstaff on separate stamps, but they did not use a date-letter. Plate thus marked is found towards the end of the seventeenth century in and near the city of Cork. One Richard Goble was a very prominent member of the company at that period. He was master in 1694 and 1695, and his mark EG appears on a mace in the South Kensington Museum (No. ’69.31), and on a communion cup dated 1694 at Ino- shannon, co. Cork. The mark WB of one William Burnett, warden in 1694 and master in 1700, occurs on more than one example. Later the word STERLING seems to have been used with a makers mark. It occurs thus on a flagon at Carrigaline, near Cork, and at other places in the South of Ireland. Examples of Cork Marks. Chalice, dated 1694. — Inoshannon, Cork. Flagon. — Carrigaline, Cork. Nothing in the way of legislation need he noted till 1729 (3 George II. c. 3. Ireland), when the Irish Parliament enacted that all articles CHAP. VII. J Ireland. r 33 of gold and silver should be assayed at Dublin by the assay-master appointed by the Company of Goldsmiths, fixed the standard of gold at 22 carats, and silver at 11 oz. 2 dwts., and ordered that the articles should be marked with the marks then used, which, we may add, would be the harp crowned, a date-letter, and the maker’s initials. The English enactments as to silver of the higher standard, were not imitated in Ireland, and no plate of that standard has ever been made there. To these marks, however, another was added in the following year 1730, by order of the Commissioners of Excise, who introduced the figure of Hibernia, to denote the payment of the duty first charged upon plate in that year. The subsequent Act of 1807, requiring the king’s head to be stamped on plate for the same purpose, took no notice of the Hibernia mark, and the two marks have since that year been used together. In 1783 a second statute (23 & 24 Geo. III. (Irish) c. 23), repealed that of 1729, as far as gold was concerned, and fixed three standards for gold, viz. of 22, 20 and 18 carats. All articles of gold were to be marked with the maker’s mark, consisting of the first letters of his Christian and surname, and the various qualities were to be distin- guished as follows : — 22-carat gold was to be marked at the assay office in Dublin with the harp crowned, and at the assay office at New Geneva then established with the harp crowned having a bar across its strings ; 20-carat gold at Dublin with a plume of three feathers, and at New Geneva with a plume of two feathers; and 18-carat gold at Dublin with a unicorn’s head, and at New Geneva with a unicorn’s head with a collar round its neck. It further ordered that the punches were to be so constructed that the impression should be indented, instead of being in relief, so as to prevent its being defaced. It will be remembered that in England the duty mark of the King’s head introduced at about this same time, is at first found “ indented ” in the fashion here described. Certain specified gold wares, and all that should weigh less than 6 dwts., were exempted from the operation of the Act. New Geneva is a village near Waterford where in 1783 a colony of foreign Protestants was established after some persecution on the Continent. Many Swiss were among them, especially Genevese, whence the name. They exercised various trades, especially working in silver and jewellery, and hence the establishment of an assay office and particular marks. After a few years and the expenditure of £30,000, the settlement was abandoned ; the Genevese became dis- contented at not having obtained as much as they wanted, and quitted the country, and the place has dwindled to a small obscure village 134 Old English Plate. [chap. VII. without any trade. It is therefore probable that very few if any articles were assayed or marked there. It remains to be said that date-letters have been used in Ireland from the time of the Charter of 1688, and as elsewhere have formed more or less regular alphabets, the course of which is, however, not always quite certain. Plate of about the middle of the last cen- tury is sometimes found hearing the other proper marks, hut no date- letter at all. The lists at the end of the volume have been most carefully com- piled from the books of the company, and from a number of specimens of plate, several of the latter kindly noted by Mr. W. D. Waterhouse, who has paid much attention to the subject. As might be expected, some few difficulties have been met with. The old English (£ for 1680-1 for example, and the for 1698-4, leave us an interval of thirteen years, but only six letters to distribute over it. If these six letters succeeded each other in regular order, from 1680 to 1686, historical events might be left to account for the next few years. The charters of all Irish Corporations were annulled for a time in 1687. and little trade in silver or gold work could have been carried on in Ireland, between the landing of King James at Kinsale in 1689, and the Treaty of Limerick which was concluded in October, 1691. It must be confessed that it is less easy to account for a second gap between the years 1695 and 1709, and if the Dublin records are to be trusted, work seems to have been regularly carried on through the most troublous times. It is understood that the matter has attracted the attention of the Royal Irish Academy, and there is therefore reason to hope that some day an authoritative explanation of it will be fur- nished. The tables given may be depended on as nearly, if not quite, accurate ; and all recent research, by fixing that the R of the alphabet which begins in 1678-9 must be certainly put at 1705-6, and the S which is the first letter which occurs in a shield with an escalloped top, at 1707-8, has gone to show that each letter probably stood for two consecutive years from 1695 to 1715. It may also have been so from 1680 to 1693, but no hall-marked examples of plate are known for that stormy period. Mr. Ryland states that the small Roman letter alphabet commenc- ing in 1821-2 was changed at the letter e (for 1825), to one of Roman capitals, by order of the Commissioners of Stamps, to denote the transfer of the duties then made to them from the Commissioners of Excise by 6 Geo. IV. c. 118, and to mark the reduction of the allow- ance of 2J dwts. per lb., which had up to this time been made from CHAP. VII. J The Dublin Marks . *35 the standard, to the allowance of 1J dwt. in accordance with the better practice of the London assay office. A careful investigation into the matter by Mr. Waterhouse, gives the letters for that cycle as they are found in the appended lists. They are all of them Roman capital letters, but a small Roman letter e in a shaped escutcheon is found in addition to the usual large letter in 1825. From the alphabetical tables a good deal of additional information may be obtained, if one or two leading facts be borne in mind. The harp crowned will be found of larger size, and on a punch adapted to the outline of the mark, until 1785 ; after which, and until 1792, it was smaller, and placed in a plain oval escutcheon, like the Hibernia which is to be looked for from the year 1730. The letters of the alphabet which commences in 1746, are to be distinguished from those of the next by their being somewhat bolder, and their shields larger and more angular at the bottom than those of the later alphabet, which last have the harp in an oval from the letter P of 1785-6 as remarked above, a second distinction. Both these hints are due to the observa- tion of Mr. Waterhouse. From about 1792 to 1808, both the harp crowned and Hibernia were in square stamps with the corners slightly cut off, and from 1808 to the end of that alphabet they are in shaped shields like the date-letter. The letter L of 1807-8 is found both with and without the sovereign’s head. During the present century, the shapes of the other stamps seem to have pretty much corresponded with the shape of the shield used for the date-letter of the year ; when that is plain or merely has the corners cut off, the same sort of shields are used for the harp, Hibernia, and King’s head ; but when shaped the escutcheons of these others correspond with it. In 1848, Dublin was stamping from 20,000 to 40,000 ounces of silver per annum, besides a small quantity of gold, the annual totals varying very much, but being about as much as the Edinburgh office, though a great deal less than Birmingham, Exeter, or Sheffield. At the time of a Parliamentary enquiry held in 1856, it was doing a some- what smaller business, nearly all the country work having fallen off, especially that coming from Cork. The business originating in Dublin itself, appeared to be somewhat on the increase. Old English Plate . [chap. VII. u6 Examples of Dublin Plate. 1638 . . . Communion flagon. — Trinity College, Dublin. 1639 [55] Communion cup, dated 1639. — Fethard, Wexford. 1640 Do. Paten, dated 1640. — Do. 1659 Communion cup, given 1659. — St. John’s-in-the-Vale, Cros- thwaite, Cumb. I 1663 Do. Communion cup, dated 1665. — Corporation of Drogheda. Do. Do. Communion cup and flagon, both dated 1667. — St. Peter’s, Drogheda. Note. — A communion plate, dated 1669, ex done Belling- ham, at Trinity College, Dublin, is by this maker. 1679 |e»s| Cups, dated 1674. — Sir J. K. James, Bart. Do. (JB) (The other initial indistinct.) Casket of St. George’s Guild, dated 1678. 1680 /ol?o\ (Probably Andrew Gregory, sworn 1673.) Tankards (see (AG) ^ O O/ woodcut, Chap. x.). — Merchant Taylors’ Co., London. Do. Do. Small communion cup, originally the property of a Dean of Cork. — Rev. H. IT. Westmore. 1693 (Thos. Bolton, Alderman of Dublin and Assay-Master this I year.) Cup, given 1696. — Mansion House, Dublin. (Do.) Cup, ex dona Duncombe. — Trinity College, Dublin. Do. Do. Do. (Probably Joseph Walker, warden 1701.) Paten, dated 1693. — Ch. Ch. Cathedral, Dublin. Do. Do. Communion cup, dated 1696. St. Nicholas’, Dublin. Do. (Probably Adam Sowt, warden 1691.) Piece of plate, dated Jan. 169|. — Abbey Leix. 1694 @ (Probably David King, warden 1699.) Flagon, dated 1698. — St. Michan’s, Dublin. 1695 . . (Thos. Bolton, as in 1693.) Cup given 1696. — Mansion House, Dublin. Do. . . . Flagon, dated 1700. — Trinity College, Dublin. Large monteith with arms and inscription. — Noted by Messrs. 1697 CSj West and Co. Do. DK (Probably David King, warden 1699.) Gadrooned salver from [ the same collection. — Do. 1699 ) Do. Mace, dated 1701, formerly belonging to the borough of Lif- 1700 ford. — Earl of Erne. Do. . . . Paten, dated 1703. — St. Mary’s, Dublin. Do. fW (Joseph Walker, as in 1693.) Flagon and paten, dated 1720. i — Ch. Ch. Cathl., Dublin. 1701 ) 1702 \ AS 1 (A. Sowt, as in 1693.) Tankard. Noted by Author. 1705 ) fW (Joseph Walker, as in 1693.) Communion cup and paten, 1706 \ dated 1706. — St. Nicholas’, Dublin. Do. DK (David King, as in 1694.) Paten undated.-=-Ch. Ch. Cathe- dral, Dublin. Do. Do. Small salver on foot. — Noted by Messrs, West and Co. Do. J (%2\ (g-M/ Taten, dated 1705. — St. Mary’s, Dublin. CHAP. VII.] Examples of Dublin Plate . 137 1707 ( 1708 ( 1707 \ 1708 J Do. 1709 \ 1710 / Do. Do. | Do 1711 i 1712 / Do. I 1715 Do. 1716 Do. DX (Thos. Bolton, as in 1693.) Paten, dated 1707. — Staplestown, Carlow. (Joseph Walker, as in 1693.) Cup, dated 1709, ex done Pal- j liser. — Trinity College, Dublin. (David King, as in 1694.) Mace. — Corporation of Enniskillen. (Joseph Walker, as in 1693.) Alms-dish. — St. Mary’s, Dublin, j Do. DK Communion cup and paten, dated 1706. — St. Nicholas’, Dublin, j Communion cup, dated 1709. — St. Margaret’s, Dromiskin. (David King, as in 1694.) Flagon, dated 1711. — St. Audoen’s, j Dublin. Do. Communion cup, given 1713. — Killeshandra, Cavan. Paten, dated 1712. — St. Mary's, Dublin. Communion plate, dated 1715. — Cashel Cathedral. (Joseph Walker, as in 1693.) Paten, dated 1716. — St. Luke's, j Dublin. (Thos. Bolton, as in 1693.) Candlesticks with square bases, j the corners cut off, winged busts on the stems. — Earl of , Ilchester. Flagon, dated 1716. — Templeport, Cavan. Do. Do. Flagon, dated 1716. — Killeshandra, Cavan. (Thos. Bolton, as in 1693.) Mace. — Corporation of Dublin. (A. Sowt, as in 1693.) Plain salver on foot. — Noted by West and Co. Alms-dish, dated 1720. — Noted by Lambert and Co. 1720 Fluted salver — late Col. Meadows Taylor, C.S.I. Do. 1724 1725 Do. Salver on feet, bearing Gore arms. — Lord Harlech. Coffee-pot — Rev. F. Sutton. Two-handled cup and cover — late J. R. Daniel-Tyssen, Esq. Alms-dish, dated 1724. — St. Michan’s, Dublin. 1726 Communion cup. — St. Nicholas’, Dublin. Do. 1728 1729 1730 1731 1732 1733 1734 Do. 1735 1736 Plain salver on foot. — Noted by Messrs. West and Co. IH DK TW Do. I-W IH Mace, dated 1728. — Goldsmiths’ Co., London. Plain bowl. — Blair O. Cochrane, Esq. (I*H, as in 1725.) Plain bowl. Noted by Messrs. West and Co. (Crowned, as in 1716.) Small salver. — Earl of Breadalbane. (As in 1726.) Flagon, dated 1731. — St. Nicholas’, Dublin. Two-handled cup. — Ion T. Hamilton, Esq. Flagon, dated 1733. — St. Patrick’s, Waterford. Jug, won by “ Smileing Bald,” at Waterford Races. — Lord Harlech. Racing cup, dated 1734. — Earl of Enniskillen. (As in 1725.) Large shaped salver and pair of small two- handled cups. — Sold at Christie & Manson’s in 1875. Old English Plate. [CHAP. VII. 138 1736 WW (As in 1728.) Gold snuff-box, presented with the freedom of ; Haas, 1737. — Earl of Shannon. 1743 i Paten. — Daglingworth, Glouc. Do. IH (As in 1725.) Table-spoons. — W. A. T. Amherst, Esq., M.P. 1744 T W (As in 1726.) Do. — Hoted by Messrs. Waterhouse. 1747 riSL Flagon. — St. Hicholas’, Dublin. 1756 2D Spoons. — Hoted by Messrs. Waterhouse. Do. El! Table-spoons, feather-edged. — J. J. Lonsdale, Esq. 1767 © Dessert-spoons. — Hoted by Messrs. Waterhouse. 1769 Large circular salver — late Col. Meadows Taylor, C.S.I. 1770 [cT] Two-handled cup. — J. Y. Burges, Esq. 1776* 31 1 Snuff-box, presented with an address, 1778. — Earl of Shannon. 1785 fMW] Sugar-basin, on three feet. — Bev. T. Staniforth. 1805 SH Cake-basket, repousse and chased. — Rev. C. Daniel. 1807 (d*) Large gravy-spoon. — Messrs. Waterhouse. 1811 ] [*L*B (Le Bas) teapot (also stamped with dealer’s name WEST). — Rev. C. Daniel. (Do.) shaped salver, on feet. — Do. 1815 | Do. Table of Dublin Marks since 1638. Quality. Silver, O.S. I Standard. Date. Harp crowned. iGold, 22 c., till 1784.f Annual letter. Ditto. Duty. Maker. Hibernia from 1730, and j Initials. King’s Head in addition from 1807. 1792 to 1S08. Ditto. Ditto. H.B. — The provisions as to gold of 15, 12, and 9 carats, of 17 & 18 Viet., c. 96, extend to Ireland, and these qualities are denoted by the same decimal numbers as in England, by way of standard marks. * The date-letter F has a small clot or pellet beneath it within the shield. f Since 1784, for standard marks on gold of 22, 20, and 18 carats, and for the Hew Geneva marks, see the notice of the Act of that year (23 & 24 Geo. III. c. 23) on p. 133. OHAPTEE Till. FRAUDS AND OFFENCES. OLD OFFENCES — THE EEPOET TO PAELI AMENT OF 1773 — THE ACTS OF 1739 AND 1844 — CASES PEOCEEDED AGAINST UNDEE THE IE PEOYISIONS — AN AMA- TEUE’S EXPEEIENCES. The lessons that may be derived by tlie plate-bnyer from a little practical experience, as well as from a record of some of the offences that have from time to time been attempted in contravention of the legislation of which we have now considered the course, are so important, that a short chapter may he fairly devoted entirely to them. Frauds are no new thing, and a description of the deceits of the goldsmiths in Queen Elizabeth’s days might almost word for word have been written in those of her present gracious Majesty. They are amusingly set out in Stubbes’ Anatomy of Abuses * thus : — “ Theodoras . Be there Goldsmithes there any store also, as in some other countries there be ? “ Amphilogus. There are inow, and more than a good meanie. They are (for the most part) very rich and wealtliye, or else they turne the fairest side outwards, as many doe in DnalgneA They have their shops and stalles fraught and bedecked with chaines, rings, gold, silver, and what not woonderfull richly. They will make you any monster or antike whatsoever of golde, silver, or what you will. They have store of all kinde of plate whatsoever. But what ? Is there no deceit in all these goodlye shewes ? Yes, too many. If you will buy a chaine of golde, a ring, or any kinde of plate, besides that you shall paye almost lialfe more than it is woorth (for they will persuade you the workmanship of it comes to so much, the fashion to so much, and I cannot tell what) ; you shall also perhaps have that golde which is naught, or else at least mixt with other drossie rubbage, and refuse mettall, which in comparison is good for nothing. And sometimes, or for the most part, you shal have tinne, lead, and the * Phillip Stubbes’ Anatomy of Abuses in | and Vintners. — New Shakspeare Society, England , Part II. 1. Tricks of Goldsmiths | Series VI., No. 12. f England. 140 Old English Plale. [CHAP. VIII. like, mixt with silver. And againe, in some tilings some will not sticke to sell you silver gilt for gold, and well if no worse too now and then. But this liappenetli very seldome, by reason of good orders, and con- stitutions made for the punishment of them that offend in this kind of deceit, and therefore they seldome dare offend therein, though now and then they chance to stumble in the darke.” There is little here that would differ from an account of practices that are, unhappily, too prevalent at the present time. The earliest provisions against fraud concern themselves with the use of metal worse than standard, the setting of false stones in gold, and of real stones in base metal, the price at which goldsmith’s work shall be sold, and the prevention of working in secret ; later on penal- ties were instituted, not only for selling silver of inferior quality, but for selling even fine silver before it was marked with the proper touches and the maker’s own mark, whilst in 1597 we come as a third stage to proceedings instituted against those who counterfeited marks, which resulted, as we have seen, in the offenders being put in the pillory and losing an ear. Some of these offences owe their very existence to a state of things, socially speaking, which has long passed away. The very notion of legislating against working in a back street, or at night, or fixing the price at which articles should be sold, is enough to raise a smile at the simplicity of mediaeval economy. Neither need we notice here the statutes directed against exporting silver and melting down the coin of the realm to make plate. Coming to modern days, a short review of the reported cases will answer the useful purpose of suggesting to the reader the sort of frauds against which he should be on his guard, even though changes in the law, and the abolition of the intricacies of special pleading, have deprived them to a certain extent of their legal interest. Several such cases were appended to the report presented to the House of Commons in 1773, this appendix being in point of fact an account of the prosecutions carried on by the Goldsmiths’ Company against persons for frauds and abuses in matters relating to gold and silver plate during the seven years then last past. They were four in number, and omitting technicalities they were as follows : — (1.) In 1767, for soldering bits of standard silver to tea-tongs and shoe-buckles, which were worse than standard, and sending them to the Company’s assay office in order fraudulently to obtain their marks to the same. (2.) In 1768, for making salt-cellars worse than the standard, and selling them for standard. chat, vm.] Frauds and Offences . 141 (8.) In 1770, for making and also for selling gold watch -chains worse than standard. (4.) In the same year for selling two silver watch-cases without being marked. To this report of 1778 was appended a remark that the heavy penalty (no less than death as a felon) imposed by 81 Geo. II., c. 32, for counterfeiting hall-marks, had greatly put a stop to frauds in wrought plate. It is more than doubtful whether as much could be said at the present day, though the goldsmiths’ trade is now regulated by an Act which does all that can he effected by careful provisions in the direction of rendering abuses difficult or impossible ; but such is the temptation to the forger of these days, in consequence of the demand for “ antique ” plate, that a single walk through the streets of London will he enough to show that present legislation is powerless against his cunning arts. The Quarterly Beviewer has not overstated the case in saying that a buyer may return home, after traversing our great thoroughfares for a day, with “a cab-load of real old English plate,” if he be not too fastidious, and has money in his purse.* By the time the reader has got to the end of this chapter, if he ever does, and if he did not know it before, he will have found where all this stuff comes from, and how little genuine antique plate is to be had at a moment’s notice, or indeed at all, however much one may be willing to pay for it. First, let us recount the main provisions of the Acts which now regulate the craft ; then note a case or two that have been dealt with under them ; and conclude the chapter with some personal experiences of the modes in which they are evaded. We may ignore, as this is not a legal treatise, the various minor provisions of the last and present centuries, altering penalties from time to time, and also certain details found only in the Sheffield and Birmingham Acts. Everything of general interest is practically summed up in the most recent Act,! which, with the Act of the reign of George II. t are those to which we now turn ; the latter still providing for the maintenance of the standards, whilst the Act of the present reign deals with abuses in the marking of wares. As to the standards, then, the Act of 1739 provided that all gold wares should not be less in fineness than 22 carats of fine gold, and all silver wares not less than 11 oz. 2 dwts. of fine silver in every pound * Quarterly Review , April, 1876. f 7 & 8 Viet. c. 22 (1844) X 12 Geo. II. c. 26 (1739). 142 [chap. viti. Old English Plate. weight Troy, and inflicted by s. 1 a penalty of ITO for every offence. It is, however, not quite certain hut that these offences are still indictable as misdemeanours under older legislation ; for the ancient Acts of 28 Edw. I., 2 Hen. VI., 18 Eliz., and 12 Will. III. are recited but not repealed by the Act w r e are now considering : and since the passing of it, prisoners have been sentenced to fine and imprisonment on indictment under 28 Edw. I. for making silver plate worse than standard. Instances of this occurred in 1758, 1759, and 1774, the last case being tried by Lord Mansfield.* The Act of 1789 also inflicts a penalty of 1M0, or in default im- prisonment, for selling, exchanging, or exposing to sale any gold or silver ware before it is duly marked ; it directs the entry of makers’ marks at the Goldsmiths’ Hall ; and it details under penalties the par- ticulars which must accompany every parcel of wares sent to the assay office for stamping. These last are repeated in the Duty Act of 1784. Turning now to the other branch of the subject, we find that every- thing relating to the prevention of frauds and abuses in the marking of gold and silver wares in England is summed up in the Act of 1844, f which enumerates the following offences, all punishable as felonies : — Sec. 2. Forging or counterfeiting any Die for marking Gold or Silver Wares or know- ingly uttering the same ; Marking Wares with forged Dies, or uttering them ; Forging any Mark of any Die, or uttering the same ; Transposing or removing Marks, or uttering them ; Having in possession knowingly any such Die, or Ware marked with the same ; Cutting or severing Marks with Intent to affix them upon other Wares ; Affixing any Mark cut or severed from any other Ware ; Fraudulently using genuine Dies. Later sections deal with other offences, as follows : — Sec. 3. Selling or having possession of any Wares with forged or transposed Marks with- out lawful excuse (even unknowing that the Marks were so forged or trans- posed) ; penalty £10 each offence. Sec. 4. Dealers to be exempt from the above penalties on giving up the names of the actual manufacturer of such wares of gold or silver or base metal, or of the person from whom they received them, but not from the consequence of uttering them with guilty knowledge. Sec. 5. Adding to, or altering by addition or otherwise, the character of wares already marked and so as to increase the weight by more than one-third of the original weight, without having them re-assayed as new ; or in certain cases, with the assent of the Company, the added part only assayed ; or selling such ware without the same being marked ; penalty £10 for each offence and forfeiture of the ware. Sec. G. Exemptions to the preceding section corresponding to those of section 4. R, v, Jackson, Cowper, 297, t 7 & 8 Viet, c. 22, chap, viil] Frauds and Offences . 143 Sec. 7. If any officer of any of the Halls shall mark any base metal with any die, etc., such Company to be liable to a penalty of £20, the officer to be dismissed and the ware seized. Sec. 8. Dealers to register every place where they work or carry on business or deposit wares, under a penalty of £5. Sec. 9. Dealers not to fraudulently erase, obliterate, or deface any mark under a penalty of £5. Sec. 11. Upon information given upon oath against persons suspected of having in possession illegal wares, etc., Justices may grant search-warrants, but not for wares not required to be marked. Sec. 13. Actions to be commenced within three months after the fact committed. This being the state of the law, at the risk of repeating what has been said by other writers, some notice must he taken of the most instructive case that had occurred under it down to the year 1876, condensing our account from that given by Mr. Ryland.* Two silversmiths were tried before Lord Denman at Taunton Spring Assizes, 1849, for having in their possession, without lawful excuse, a silver spoon and soup-ladle having thereon marks of dies used by the Goldsmiths’ Company which had been transposed from silver skewers. The spoon and ladle were of modern make, but bore the mark of the year 1774. An officer from the Goldsmiths’ Company proved that, on clearing off the gilding and using a blow-pipe, he found that the spoon and ladle were not made in one piece, which would he the ordinary mode of manufacture, but that the parts bearing the marks were “inserted” or “brought on.” A working silversmith proved that by direction of the prisoners he had made and sent to them two silver-bowls for spoons ; that they afterwards were returned to him with handles attached to be gilt, and when he burnished them he perceived the old hall-marks ; he proved also that the bowls and stems, or handles, were generally made together. The defence set up was that this did not amount to a transposition , but was only an addition, a minor offence under the Act and entailing a lesser penalty ; and it was suggested that the spoon and ladie were made by using old silver skewers with the old hall-mark for the stems, and adding to them bowls and figures at the top called “apostles” in order to give them the appearance of old plate, and that this was an addition, which, though a fraud in contravention of the act, would not be a felony. This ingenious transposal of the process commended itself to the jury, and they acquitted the prisoners, though evidently against the summing-up of the learned judge, who thought that the description of transposition in one section, and of addition in another, came to much the same thing, and avowed that he was at a loss to see Assay of Gold and Silver Wares, London, 1852. 144 [chap. yiti. Old English Plate. any difference between taking out just merely the mark and putting it into a new article, which would clearly be a transposition, and doing the same thing with some more dexterity and more disguise in a con- siderable length. A more recent case is not less suggestive. D. L. G., a dealer, carrying on business in London, was convicted at the Central Criminal Court in August, 1876, of feloniously altering and transferring a certain mark of a die used by the Goldsmiths’ Company under the following circumstances. A customer found displayed in the prisoner’s shop, and purchased for ^610, a coffee-pot, hall-marked and bearing the letter m of the year 1747, there being appended to it a label with the words “ 120 years old.” He also purchased of the prisoner a small silver ewer, bearing the goldsmiths’ letter for 1744. It being found that the articles were of recent manufacture, the Goldsmiths’ Company issued a writ against the prisoner to recover penalties under s. 8 of the Act we are considering, in regard to which, under another section, a dealer could, however, be protected if within twenty-one days he gave up the name of the person from whom he bought the article. At first stating that he had bought the article in the way of trade and did not know from whom, he afterwards gave the name of a working electro-plater, who was thereupon arrested and, on the prisoner’s evidence being committed for trial, pleaded guilty. Judgment was postponed, and his evidence taken against the principal offender, from which it appeared that he had transferred to the coffee- pot and ewer certain old marks from pieces of silver brought to him by the prisoner for that purpose, the prisoner agreeing to purchase those articles if the witness w T ould put the old marks on. The offenders were thereupon sentenced, the dealer to six months and the electro-plater to two months’ imprisonment, in both cases with hard labour. A number of penalties were sued for in the course of the year 1878, by the Goldsmiths’ Company ; and in one case no less a sum than ^9240 paid on account of the sale of 24 forks bearing forged hall-marks of a good period. It would be very desirable to give fullest publicity to all such convictions ; without this they have but little effect. A few words may conveniently be said here about the importation of plate bearing forged English marks. Legislation upon this abuse seems to commence with a Customs Act of 1842 (5 & 6 Yict. c. 47), which enacts that foreign plate shall not be sold unless duly assayed and marked, but does not oblige the importer to send such plate to be marked at the time of its importation , nor indeed at any time. Another Customs Act of the same year (5 & 6 Yict, c. 56), provides 145 chap, viii.] Frauds and Offences. that ornamental plate made prior to the year 1800 may be sold with- out being marked. Lastly, a third such Act, passed in 1867 (80 & 81 Viet. c. 82), directs that any imported plate sent to an assay office to be marked, shall be marked with all the usual marks, and with the letter F in an oval escutcheon in addition. This Act has been repealed ; hut the provision in question was re-enacted (89 & 40 Viet. c. 85) in the same words. It will easily he seen that none of these enactments offer any real hindrance to the importation of plate hearing forged English marks, and some stringent legislation is sorely needed to put a stop to fraudulent practices and to protect the honest dealer and the public alike. There is nothing, however, so telling as personal experience : let us see what can be picked up in this way by the amateur of old plate as he walks along the London streets. He will soon see that in consequence of the first series of imita- tions having been usually of seventeenth century plate, and the better credit that silver work of the reigns of Queen Anne and the earlier Georges therefore maintained, the latter period became in time the more profitable one to attack, and that the market is now flooded with the plain and fluted plate of those reigns, which is made to all appearance, both at home and abroad for importation hither, hv the waggon-load. Next he will find that the modern forger scorns to be at the trouble of transposing or adding, call it which you will, genuine old hall- marks to modern plate. He boldly fashions antique plate, marks and all ; and here we may say that so far from giving him information to turn to base advantage, as one writer has feared would he the case, the published lists of date-letters and other marks have, by their very inaccuracies, proved pit-falls for those who have used them for purposes of fraud. How shall we distinguish the real from the spurious ? Well, one chance is, that our enquirer finds in nine cases out of ten that the forger has not learned his lesson thoroughly. A living amateur has seen, for instance, at a public exhibition in London, a large jug conspicuously labelled as by the famous George Heriot, which bore marks which could only belong to the end of the seventeenth century, if they were genuine at all ; and they were not if the said amateur knew anything about the matter. He has also seen, as conspicuously labelled in a shop-window, a pair of Queen-Anne-pattern candlesticks, bearing what purported to be a well-known maker’s mark, and beside I; 146 Old English Plate. [CHAP. VIII. it the date-letter of a year that had elapsed long before the adoption and registration by that maker of the particular mark in question. What would the unsophisticated collector say to finding that two specimens of Queen Anne plate in his cabinet, with their gadrooned edges, court-hand date-letters and all, of some five or ten years apart, and by quite different makers, proved on a careful examination of the ornamentation, to have come from the same modern atelier , a certain small defect in one of the tools used having left its fatal sign on both articles alike ? What, again, if he should see an Elizabethan treasure, say of 1576, put into a sale by its disgusted owner, who had arrived at a know- ledge of its real age all too late, and knocked down by the auctioneer for a small sum as what is called in the trade a “ duffer,” amid the pleasantries of an appreciative audience of dealers who will possibly welcome it again before long under much the same circum- stances ? Another surprise may await him if he should be fortunate enough to secure for his collection some relic of thrilling historical interest, such as a cup proved by the inscription upon it to have been the gift of Mary Queen of Scots to Darnley ; for it is not beyond the hounds of possibility that he may meet ere long with a second cup, of precisely similar pattern, and proved as conclusively to have been the one given in exchange by Darnley to that unfortunate lady. As he will hardly expect to pick up a third treasure of this descrip- tion, he may perhaps turn his attention to real old “ family plate,” of which he may think that there is likely to be more in the market. It would be very odd if he did not soon come across plenty to be sold, “ in strict confidence,” and “under peculiar circumstances,” with a condition that the ancient coats of arms with which it is decorated are to be carefully erased. Much of this precious stuff has been bought by those who have afterwards found that, like some other people who preceded them — sero sapiunt Phryges , — they have come by their wisdom too late. A most flagrant case came to light long after the publication of the first edition of this volume in 1878, and it is full of warning, illustrating almost every point that has been mentioned in the last few pages. Were it not an actual fact, it would be hard to believe that dealer dared sell, or buyer could be found to buy, a set of many hundreds of spoons, forks, and other table plate marked as of the first ten or fifteen years of the eighteenth century. More astonishing still is it that, though he marked his wares as of Britannia standard, the manufacturer should not have taken the trouble to make up his metal CHAP. VIII.] Modern Frauds. 147 to that quality, for the chance of avoiding detection by the assay ; and most astonishing of all that he should have included in his set, dessert- knives, fish-slices, and other articles unheard of in bygone days. The handles of the forks appear to have been cast, marks and all, in a mould made from a spoon-liandle, and then fastened on to prongs, for which cast-metal would not have been sufficiently hard and un- bending. Great numbers of these had the letter for 1703-4, with the Britannia standard marks, and for maker’s mark the letters $ with a crown above, and a pellet below them, all within a circle. Others had the letter for 1712-3 with for maker’s mark on a stamp with indented edge ; others, again, had as it appears in ap- pendix A at the year 1782, together with the London hall-marks for 1683-4. And many other blunders of the same sort came to light as soon as the objects were submitted to careful examination. On the institution of proceedings the dealer who sold all this rubbish gave up, under the provisions of section 4 of the Act of 1844, the name of a person from whom he said he had received it in the ordinary way of business ; and in the end judgment was signed by the Gold- smiths’ Company against this person for the full amount of £10 for each of the articles of which there were 647, bearing forged marks. It seems very much open to question whether the Act works at all well, or for the interests of the public. Penalties are nominally recovered, it is true, by the Goldsmiths’ Company ; but the forger goes to work again as before at his profitable trade, escaping in most cases by judicious and timely surrender, the exposure which would be the only effectual hindrance to his operations. If full advertisement in the newspapers of all penalties recovered by the Company were part of the punishment inflicted upon such offenders, it would probably he much more dreaded and more effectual. It is sometimes possible to guess correctly the very shop from which articles purporting to be of the Queen Anne period have come, from the marks used upon them. A much-abused mark has been that of William Gamble ; being the letters G A under a crown with a pellet on each side, all in a circle. There is no need to condemn all plate found bearing these various marks ; but much that is spurious having been put into circulation so marked, it will be well to be cautious about such and the like specimens. The date-letters for 1683, 1739 and 1746 have been seen by the author so well executed as almost to defy detection, did they stand alone, 1 2 148 Old English Plate . [CHAP. VIII. Should the collector fail in finding ready to his hand anything of sufficient historical or family interest to tempt him, let him further beware of giving orders for articles not to he found of the date he covets, — a coffee-pot of the reign of Queen Elizabeth for example, — or he will run the risk of finding his newly acquired possession, when at last some fortunate agent has picked up one for him, to be formed of the sloping body of an ordinary chalice of a well-known type in those days turned bottom upwards to get the slope the right way and fitted with a foot, lid, handle and spout of suitable fashion, the position of the hall-marks upside down in a row round the lower part of the pot revealing to the initiated alone the ingenious adaptation. Here we may remark that the observant amateur will soon find a e’ood ffuide in the situation of the hall-marks ; those marks were o o always placed by rule, and will he found in unusual positions on pieces of plate that have been altered from their original shape. An early tankard ought to he marked on the side near the handle, and straight across the flat lid in a parallel line with the purchase or perhaps upon the flange of the lid, hut a more modern one will be stamped on the bottom and inside the lid ; a standing cup of Queen Anne or earlier hears the marks round the margin, one of thirty years later on the bottom of the howl up inside the hollow stem, and so on in other cases. Time was when ornamentation of one date coupled with hall-marks of another would have passed muster, and for the detection of such anomalies as these the illustrations given in later chapters will be of some use ; hut blunders of this kind are not so frequent now, and the buyer is left to the careful examination first of the metal itself, then of the execution rather than the fashion of the ornamentation, and lastly of the hall-marks. The silver in spurious specimens will be rolled perhaps, instead of hammered, and betray to the practised eye and hand what has been called “ a fatal air of newness ; ” the same fatal air may condemn the fashion and decoration, especially the gilding if any he present ; and the hall-marks are still so little understood that forgeries almost court detection by trained eyes, but trained they must he. Failing this, the buyer can scarcely do better than resort for what he wants to one or other of the great houses of goldsmiths whose names are household words, and leave himself in their hands, or to some one whom he knows to be a respectable and well- skilled tradesman. Good plate and genuine after all can be got, and it is into such hands that what is really valuable generally passes. Patience and money the collector will require, and plenty of both ; for such houses as these do not make old plate to order, and they are as much CHAP. VIII.] Modern Frauds. 1 49 as other people under the laws of supply and demand which regulate the price of it when it comes into the market. But if the buyer prefer foraging for himself, whether in highway, bye-way, or sale-room, to be forewarned is to some extent to be fore- armed ; and surely he is better off with the means of forming a good judgment placed at his disposal than if ignorant of facts the greater part of which are already well known to the fraudulent, and daily used by them against their victims. We cannot end the chapter better than with the words — caveat emptor. CHAPTER IX. ECCLESIASTICAL PLATE. EPISCOPAL CONSTITUTIONS RELATING TO CHURCH PLATE — CHURCH GOODS, HOW AFFECTED BY THE EVENTS OF THE REIGNS OF EDWARD VI. AND QUEEN ELIZABETH — CHALICES EXCHANGED FOR COMMUNION CUPS — PRE-REFORMA- TION CHALICES AND PATENS — ELIZABETHAN COMMUNION CUPS — MODERN CHALICES, COMMUNION CUPS AND PATENS — FLAGONS — ALMS - DISHES — CANDLESTICKS. The preceding chapters have dealt with the marks by which the age and authenticity of ancient plate may he verified, and it is time to turn to what remains of the possessions of our ancestors, and to see what additional information may he gathered from its fashion and other circumstances. It will be convenient to divide the subject into two portions, devot- ing the present chapter to ecclesiastical plate, and reserving decorative and domestic plate for separate consideration. The misfortunes that befell the goods of the Church in England during the sixteenth century, and the simplicity of later ritual, have shortened the history of our church-plate a good deal. The examples of pre-Beformation art now left in England are comparatively few ; those of any importance are very few indeed ; for the rest, cathedral and church alike possess certain simple articles of communion and altar plate of dates ranging from the reign of Edward VI. to the present day, and varying in their design from time to time, as we shall see, hut hardly ever rising to any high level of art excellence. It is difficult to realise the splendour of the display that would have met the eye of him who entered one of our great cathedrals or wealthy parish churches on any high festival day in the three or four centuries that preceded the Beformation. The church was the nursing-mother of the arts, which lent themselves in their turn to the adornment of her services ; the monks were the goldsmiths of the middle ages ; St. Dunstan himself was the patron of their craft in England ; what wonder, then, that the wealth of gold and silver in its shrines and treasuries was immense, so immense as to be almost incredible. It would be foreign to our present purpose to reprint long lists of CHAr. IX.] Mediceval Church Plate . 151 treasures, of which not so much as an article remains ; hut some few historical remarks are necessary to enable us to understand the earlier specimens of English churcli-plate that still exist. Let us take for a starting-point the episcopal constitutions which ordained what ornaments and furniture were necessary for the ordinary service of the church. One of the best of these is that of Robert Winchelsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1298 — 1818, who directs, in 1305, that parishes should provide, and keep in proper repair, the following articles : — * “ Legendam antiplionarium gradale psalterium troperium ordinale missale manuale calicem vestamentum principale cum casula dalmatica tunica et cum capa in choro cum omnibus suis appendiciis frontale ad magnum altare cum tribus titellis tria superpellicia unum rochetum crucem processionalem crucem pro mortuis thuribulum lucernam tintinabulum ad deferendum coram corpore Christi in visitatione infirmorum pixidem pro corpore Christi honestum velum quadrage- simale vexilla pro rogationibus cainpanas cum chordis feretrum pro defunctis vas pro aqua benedicta osculatorium candelabrum pro cereo Paschali fontem cum serura imagines in ecclesia imaginem principalem in cancello.” In another edition of these same constitutions a chrismatory is added to the above requirements. We have given the complete list, as it is a very full and interesting one, and more of it has some relation to the art of the goldsmith than might seem likely at first sight ; for besides the sacramental vessels, the pyx, censer (thuribulum), chrismatory, and pax (osculatorium), the images also and the covers of the service-books were often of silver and of great weight. The image of its patron saint, taken from the chapel of St. Stephen at Westminster in the time of Henry VIII., weighed no less than thirteen score and thirteen ounces, and the inventory of St. Olave’s, Southwark, in 1552, includes a “ gospeller booke garnyshed with sylver and parcell gylte with Mary and John, weynge cxx. ounces,” and a “ pisteler booke with Peter and Palle garnished with sylver and parcell gylte weynge C. ounces.” Such covers as these served as pax-bredes or osculatories. The requirements of Winchelsey are almost identical with those of Archbishop Simon in 1368 ; and if certain other articles, such as phials for wine and water and also candlesticks, are mentioned by an earlier prelate, Gilbert de Bridport, Bishop of Sarum in 1256, the pyx, the vessel for holy-water, and the pax — all included by Archbishop Lyndewode, Provincialise Lib. iii. tit. De ecclesiis edificandis, (o. 137 . Old English Plate. [chai*. IX. 152 Winclielsey — are omitted from tlie more ancient list. The constitu- tions of William de Bleys in 1229 add but a single item of interest, an unconsecrated chalice, which might be of tin, for burial with the priest.* Further, it is clear that even in early days country churches were properly supplied with all these vessels, vestments, books, and other necessaries. The inventories taken by William de Swyneflete, Arch- deacon of Norwich in or about 1368, the year of Archbishop Simon’s Constitutions, may be quoted to show that the Norwich churches were all amply supplied at that time, and later visitations give the same testimony.! In the days of Edward YI. there is good evidence of the great value of parish church plate years after the events of his father’s reign had bestowed the still greater treasures of cathedrals and monasteries upon the king under the general name of “ Church-stuff.” St. Olave’s, Southwark, in 1552 still possessed no less than 1062 ounces of silver in chalices, crosses, basins, mounted covers for the books, pyxes, a pax, a clirismatory, censers, cruets, and the like ; a church in Norwich returned a list of 857 ounces to the commissioners about the same time ; and it was the same everywhere, the amounts varying with the importance of the parishes. It is hardly fair, therefore, to charge King Henry VIII. and his advisers with the whole course of spoliation which the Church suffered in the years which followed 1536. On the contrary, it was reserved for succeeding reigns to carry on and complete the work of destruction which was then only commenced. The seizure of parish church plate was not decided upon until the last year of King Edward VI., and some was left untouched till the days of the Protestant reaction which marked the accession of Elizabeth and resulted in some places in a repetition of the excesses in which the puritanism of her brother’s reign had vented itself. Whilst all this was going on, it is not wonderful that parochial authorities, alarmed at the misfortunes befalling their more powerful neighbours, the monasteries, guilds, and fraternities, took advantage of the excuse afforded by the necessity of altering their churches, and adapting them to the new and more simple ritual, and of repairing the damage done by the destruction of painted glass, images, and all that could come under the denomination of “ monuments of superstition,” to dispose of a portion of their more valuable property by way of meet- * For these two last-mentioned Constitu- ! f Norfolk and Norwich Archaeology , Yol. tions, see Wilkins’s Concilia , Vol. I., pp. V. 93. 714 and 623. I chap, ix.] Church Goods under Edward VI. 153 ing these extraordinary expenses. This practice, commencing about 1586, soon became so general, that the commissioners sent through the land more than once in the reign of Edward YI. professed to take their inventories for the purpose of stopping it, and ensuring the pre- servation of all that was left. In fact, their proceedings go far to show that up to that time, whilst much that was valuable had been alienated by churchwardens themselves for repairs and other like expenses, real or pretended, neither plunder nor embezzlement from other quarters had done much harm. This, however, compels us to note in passing the extraordinary number of losses by thieves that are mentioned in the returns of these churchwardens. If they are to be believed, almost every church in many counties was broken into and robbed at some time or other in the interval between 1547 and 1558. It may have been so, but when we remember that the commissioners of the year last mentioned were ordered to make strict comparison of the returns now made to them, with the best of the inventories compiled in answer to the earlier inquisitions of the reign, and that under these circumstances it became very doubtful how much of the proceeds of any sales of church furniture that had been effected, the parishes would be allowed to retain, even under the pretence of their having- been spent upon repairs, it is hardly possible to get rid of a suspicion that such an allegation as a loss by robbery was found the simplest mode of accounting for missing articles. Many of the returns honestly represented that by “ the consent and agreement of all the parishioners,” the churchwardens had sold some of their plate, and spent the proceeds on improvements and necessary expenses. Large quantities of church stuff* came in this way into private hands ; and this would seem to dispose, to some extent, of the charges so broadly made by Heylin, and repeated also in Fuller’s Church History, of general plunder and spoliation. Both these authorities comment upon the parlours to be found hung with altar-cloths, tables and beds covered with copes, carousing cups made of chalices, and the like ; Fuller saying, that ‘ k as if first laying hands upon them were sufficient title unto them ; seizing on them was generally the price they had paid for them ; ” and Heylin that, “ It was a sorry house and not worth the naming, which had not somewhat of this furniture in it.” But how, we may remark, could it be otherwise if churchwardens provided themselves as best they could with the funds they required for such purposes as the following, which may be taken as a fair sample,* viz.: — “ altering of oure churche, and fynisshing of the same according to our myndes Norfolk A rchceology, Yol. YI. p. 364. '54 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. and the parisshioners. Itm., for the new glassing of xvii. wyndows wherein were conteyned the lyves of certen prophane histories and other olde wyndows in church. Itm. for and towards the paying of the hinge’s highe way in stoans aboughte our Churche and in our Parisshe which was foule and needfull to be doon. Item, for a clieste and a box sette in our Churche according to the Kinge’s Maties Injunctions.” Such were the objects upon which some Norwich churchwardens had spent the money ; and after all, these and the like alterations and repairs were ordered by the Injunctions issued on the accession of Edward YI. in 1547 “ to all his loving subjects, clergy and laity,” though it was not perhaps intended that they should be paid for by the sale of valuables which might eventually be seized by the Crown when decent pretence arose. Much of these injunctions reappeared in the following year in the Yisitation Articles of the province of Canterbury, which at the same time straitly enquired of the clergy “ whether they have not monished their parishioners openly that they should not sell, give, nor otherwise alienate any of their Church goods.” * But Boyal injunctions were more imperative than episcopal monitions, and the expenses were no doubt met in the most obvious way ; indeed these injunctions actually authorised the churchwardens to bestow part of their property upon the reparation of the church, “ if great need requires, and whereas the parish is very poor, and not able otherwise to repair the same.” So things went on until the last year of Edward YI., when the final step was taken of seizing all that was then left, or nearly all, for the Commissioners were directed even then to leave “ one, two, or more chalices or cuppes according to the multitude of people.” For this the Crown may have said in excuse that by this time all the repairs and alterations rendered necessary by the Beformation had been effected, and that what was still over after making all due pro- visions for the future use of the Church according to the simplified ritual was superfluous if not superstitious, and in either case proper for conversion to His Majesty’s use. It may be asked where then are these “ one, two, or more chalices,” even if all the rest have perished ? Will they not form an ample remnant by which to judge the ecclesiastical goldsmith of earlier times ? Alas ! it must be said that they too have perished with the rest, for whilst the instructions of the Commissioners directed their return, * Cardwell’s Documentary Annals, Vol. I. 42. CHAP. IX.] Chalices Abolished. 155 the King’s injunctions ensured their destruction ; for by the latter, after more minute provisions, it was directed in one sweeping general clause that “ all monuments of feigned miracles, pilgrimages, idolatry and superstition ” were to he taken away, utterly extinguished, and destroyed, “ so that there remains no memory of the same in walls, glass windows, or elsewhere within churches or houses.” The holy vessels that had been used at the Mass were from this point of view no less “ monuments of superstition ” than the representa- tions of saints in windows of painted glass, or sculptured in stone to occupy the canopied niches of the reredos, and all fell under the same ban. Let us illustrate its practical working by the case of the parish of Dartford in Kent, where the Commissioners are found expressly ordering, in 1553 (6 Edward YI.), that the chalices and patens, and a pax to add to the quantity of silver retained by the inhabitants, should “ be exchanged by the said church-wardens for ij cuppes to receyve the Communyon in to amount to the like weyght and value.” Some parishes, in compliance with the feeling of the time and the injunc- tions, had already altered their chalices into Communion cups. Quite as many of the parishes in the county of Surrey in the year last- mentioned certify to the possession of communion cups as of chalices ; some return in their list of plate one of each, marking the distinction, and some mention the exchange of one for the other. The church- wardens of St. Andrew’s, Norwich, mention such a transaction, also in 6 Edward YI. “ There do no we remayne in the seide Churche at this day one Communyon Cuppe weing xl. unces parcell gilte at v s the unce S m x li. whiche was made of twoo peir of clialleis w t the patens parcell gilte.” St. Saviour’s, Southwark, sometime between the inventory taken in 1548 and that of 1552, had parted with four chalices weighing fifty-four ounces to one Calton at the sign of the Purse in Cheap, of which the said Calton made two communion cups weighing but fifty- two ounces. The parish was constrained to charge the difference, being 17s. 8 d., against itself, on the occasion of the later of the above inventories being taken. * The parochial authorities of Wimbledon, co. Surrey, record among the receipts for 1552 the following : — “ Keceivede for thre chalisses waying xxx u and v ounces at v s the ownce whereof went to the communyon cuppe xxj ounces and a Surrey Church Notes, by J. R. Daniel-Tyssen, Esq Old English Plate . [CHAP. IX. i 56 quartern which commetli to v 11 vi s iij d . And so remayneth xiij ownces and thre quartours which commythe to iii u viii s ix d whereof paide to Robert Wygge goldesmythe of London for the making and gilding of the communyon cupp after xx d an ounce which commytli to xxxy s v d .”* A few such communion cups provided under Edward VI. may still be seen. Two are the property of St. Margaret’s, Westminster, to this day ; but most of them were only made to be almost directly destroyed again, as unfit for the purposes of the restored ritual of the reign of Queen Mary. True it is that the respite consequent upon her accession following so quickly upon the heels of the Commissioners, for the King died that same year, saved for a time some of the few ancient chalices left by them in accordance with their instructions in the hands of their owners : for such of these as had not been immediately destroyed, like those at Dartford, were brought again into use, and of course carefully preserved until the end of Queen Mary’s short reign. In some cases, too, the Commissioners had not had time to carry out their work at all. Chelmsford, for example, is found dealing with plate in 1558, which would not then have been in existence at all if the Commissioners of Edward VI. had ever got there. But at last these relics, which had weathered all previous storms, fell victims to the stringent orders of Queen Elizabeth and her prelates at the head of the outburst of Protestant zeal which then ensued. Once again were the Injunctions of King Edward VI. re-enforced, and repeated almost word for word in those issued by Elizabeth. The proscribed church goods were again followed even into private hands, for the Visitation Articles of 1558 enquire, as did those of 2 Edward VI., 4 4 whether you know any that keep in their houses any undefaced images, tables, pictures, paintings, or other monuments of feigned and false miracles, pilgrimages, idolatry and superstition, and do adore them, and especially such as have been set up in churches, chapels, and oratories.” Inclination and injunction seemed now to work in harmony, and each parish vied with, its neighbours in the haste with which it proceeded to melt up what remained of its plate, especially all that had been profaned by use at the Mass, and to get rid of its other church furniture. The books were sold to pedlars “ to lap spices in ” ; the sacring bell was “ hung about a calf’s neck ” or “ at a horse’s ear,” and the holy water vat was turned into a swine’s trough.! But still * Surrey Church Notes, by J. R. Daniel-Tyssen, Esq t Peacock’s Church Furniture. CIIAP. IX.] Purchase of. Communion Chips. 157 it seemed to the bishops of the reformed Church necessary to maintain the stringency of former orders, and even as late as 1569 we find amongst articles to be enquired of within the diocese of Canterbury at the ordinary Visitation of Matthew Parker, the following : — * “ Whether they do minister in any prophane cuppes, bowles, dishes, or chalices heretofore used at masse or els in a decent Communion cuppe provided and kept for the same purpose only.” Lastly, we may quote the Visitation Articles of Archbishop Grindal, in 1576, enquiring “ Whether you have in your Parish Churches and Chapels, a fair and comely Communion Cup of Silver, and a Cover of Silver for the same, which may serve also for the ministration of the Communion Bread.” The churchwardens’ accounts of every year from 1558 teem with notes of changes made in obedience to these orders ; a few examples may be taken from town and country. Amongst the parochial payments of St. Andrew-Hubbard in London for 1558 is the following : — “ Paide for the Eschaunge of two chalices with the covers weygh- ing xxxii oz. lialfe for a communion cup waying xxx oz. and halfe thexchaunge with the odde oz. at xiiij s viij d .” At Chelmsford these items occur in 1560 : — “ Received of Mr. Mustchampe goldsmyth at the syne of the ring with the rube in Lumbarde St. for a gylt challys with a paten gylt waying xxiii oz. and a quarter at v s iiij d the ounce, som is vi n iiij s . “Paid to Mr. Muschamp in Lombard St. at the synge of the ring with the rube for a coupe of gilt weighing 19 oz. 8 qr., 6 s 8 d the oz., som is ^£6. 11. 7.” Bungay St. Mary in 1568 pays “For a Co’mmunyon cuppe made of one payer of chalice havyng a cover, for workmanship and some silv’, xxi s .” The Leverton churchwardens in 1570 pay “ Thomas Turpyn the goldsmith for facyonenge of the Communyon Cupp weynge xii oz., x s . “ It m he putt to the same cupp a q ter and a half of an ounce of his own silver ij s .” At Eltham they exchange a chalice and paten weighing 18 J oz. for a cup and cover only 10 oz. in weight. At Lyminge in Kent there is a curious little cup of the year 1561-2, bought with a bequest to the church of vli. by one Daniel Spycer in 1558 for the purchase of a chalice. Four years later, at the Arch- bishop’s visitation in 1562, it is recorded as decreed “ that a Commu- Card well’s Documentary Annals, I. 321. Old English Plate . [chap. IX. 158 7iion Cuppe shall be bought with the money.” The cover of this cup is of different make, and engraved with the date 1578 ; this was added no doubt in compliance with the enquiry in that behalf made by the Visitation Articles of Archbishop Grindal in 1576. The cup itself had always been supposed to be of the date engraved on the cover, but the present rector’s discovery of the visitation of 1562 has proved the hall-mark to be a safe guide. It may be added that the cup is by the same maker as the oldest Protestant Communion Cup known, being one of those at St. Lawrence, Jewry. In some parts of the country, perlmps owing to the energy of the diocesan, these changes were effected more promptly than in others. In the diocese of Norwich so many of the cups that remain are either of the year 1567 or 1568 that it suggested an enquiry whether the Bishop of Norwich of that day, John Parkhurst, was not an excep- tionally zealous reformer. He had been one of the exiles at Zurich, and Strype says of him, “ and so delighted was he with the discipline and doctrine of that Church, that he often wished that our Church were modelled exactly according to that.”* The annalist goes on to say, “ this bishop was supposed to be inclinable to the puritans, and to wink at them.” To these notes may be added an extract from his injunctions of 1561, the year of his first visitation, in which he directs his clergy to “ see the places filled up in walles or ellswhere where imagies stode, so as if ther hadde been none there.” Again, in later injunctions of 1569, he asks, “Item, whether you have in your Church a decent pulpit and Communion table, furnished and placed as becometli, with a comely Communion cup with a cover.” I 11 Worcestershire so many cups of the year 1571 occur, that Archdeacon Lea, enquiring lately into the subject, was led to suppose that this was the case all over England, and to search for some reason for the coincidence, just as the present writer had done some years ago for Norfolk. In the neighbouring county of Gloucester, cups of 1576 or 157. are much more common than those of any other years. In the west of England, Devon, and Cornwall, most of these cups were obtained quite as late as in Gloucestershire, but every village far and near was properly provided by 1580 ; and not only wero they so provided, but in many a church the very same “fair and comely Com- munion Cup ” is in existence and in use at the present day. Some have urged that these exchanges were made merely because Annals , I. ii. pp. 508-9. CHAP. IX.] Purchase of Communion Cups. 159 the chalices were too small for congregational use ; but it will be observed that in many of the above-mentioned instances the com- munion cup is no larger, and in more than one case is of even less weight, than the chalice it replaces. The tone of the episcopal visita- tion articles is, however, conclusive as to the real reason for it, and some of the earlier ones speak in plainer terms than the later versions we have already quoted.* For instance, Grindal, when Archbishop of York, had in 1571 required his clergy 44 to minister the Holy Com- munion in no challice nor any profane cup or glasse, but in a Com- munion Cup of Silver, and with a cover of Silver appointed also for the ministration of the Communion bread.” Since this chapter was originally printed, the late Rev. J. Fuller Russell, B.C.L., gave in the Aclueological Journal (vol. xxxv. p. 48), the reply of George Gardiner, one of the Prebendaries of Canterbury, to Archbishop Parker’s “ articles to be enquired of,” in Canterbury Cathedral in 1567. “ This respondent saith that their divine service is duely songe in maner and forme, according to the Queen’s Injunc- tions : saving that the Communion, as he saith, is ministered in a chalice, contrary, as he saith, to the Advertisements .... He wold have service songe more deliberately with Psalms at the beginning and ending of service, as is appointed by the Injunctions ; and their chalice turned into a decent communion cup.” Mr. Russell observed that neither chalices nor cups are even men- tioned in Archbishop Parker’s Advertisements of 1566 ; but that in 1562 he had, according to Strype, intended to order 44 chalices to be altered to decent cups.” His proposed articles of 1562, were 4 4 exhibited to be admitted by authority, but not so allowed,” and therefore never issued; but as Mr. Russell proceeds, 44 Master Gar- diner may have had some inkling of the Archbishop’s inclination in favour of the alteration of chalices to decent cups and sagaciously opined that his recommendation of it might advance him in the good graces of his Metropolitan, who notwithstanding his failure to obtain the allowance of authority for such a change in 1562, did not scruple to enjoin it in 1575, if not before.” It may be noted as a curious fact that a great number of the Elizabethan communion cups still preserved in the arch-diocese of Canterbury are of the very year 1562. We are now in a position to say what the antiquary may expect to find around him in church or cabinet. It may be summed up very shortly ; he will find a few — a very few — Gothic chalices and their patens, remains of pre-Reformation art. * Appendix to Second Report of the Ritual Commission, p. 411. 160 Old English Plate . [chap. ix. The writer of these pages does not know, after extensive enquiry, of much more than a score ; and these have, no doubt, owed their preser- vation in each case to some favouring local circumstances. He will find here and there a communion cup with its cover of the reign of Edward VI., made no doubt of the materials afforded by some more ancient chalice. Of these there are still fewer than of the chalices which preceded them ; and next in order he will find broad- cast over the whole country a multitude of examples of the communion cups provided in the first years of Queen Elizabeth under the circum- stances that have been narrated, each with its paten-cover ; and he will find flagons of shapes varying with their date, and other special considerations to be mentioned later. Coming to more modern times there is less and less to be said ; the needs of an increased population, and the pious liberality of donors, have added from time to time to the quantity of our church plate, but not to its interest or artistic value. Art in these matters appears to have steadily declined from the middle of the sixteenth to the middle of the present century, when a salutary reaction has directed attention to the examples that Gothic art has left for our study and guidance. Modern reproductions of these, in some cases admirable, in others still leave much to be desired ; a slavish adhe- rence to ancient models that cannot be surpassed would be better than the bastard results of coupling pure Gothic form with inappropriate ornamentation, or of adapting beautiful Gothic adornment to articles of tasteless modern shape. CHALICES. In the early days of the Church, chalices were no doubt formed of various materials, some of them simple and quite the reverse of costly. But in process of time objections were found to these ; wood was porous, and liable to absorb a portion of the sacred element placed within ; horn was an animal substance and so formed by blood ; glass, crystal and precious stones were all brittle and liable to fracture ; and at length the precious metals alone were allowed to be employed. It was decreed by the Council of Rheims in 847 that if not of gold, chalices should be wholly of silver ; tin being allowed only in cases where means to provide anything better were wanting. Other materials were forbidden altogether. Silver is prescribed by a consti- tution of Stephen Langton (1206),* the commentator in Lyndewode adding “ rel aufeum .” The earliest chalices now known to exist in Lyndewode, lib. iii,, fol. 136, CHAP. IX.] Chalices. 161 England are some that have from time to time been discovered in the coffins of bishops and priests of the eleventh and following centuries. Examples, both of silver and pewter, have been found in coffins at York, Lincoln, St. David’s, Hereford, Salisbury and Chichester Cathedrals, and also at other places. Those in the coffins which are supposed to be of Bishops Seffride and Hilary, successively occupants of the See of Chichester in the twelfth century, were of silver gilt, and have their patens. An earlier one, probably buried with Bishop Godefridus of Chichester, who died in 1088, is of pewter ; this also has its paten. Those found at Salisbury are of good shape, the bowls wide and shallow, the stem and foot being circular, decorated with chasing, and having ornamental knops of the thirteenth century. An illustration is given of a pew- ter coffin chalice found at Cheam in Surrey,* of the thirteenth cen- tury ; its paten is placed in the top of the bowl. This is of ruder design than the silver ones found at Salisbury. A silver one of about the same date and fashion, until lately in use at the village church of Berwick St. James, Wilts, is now preserved in the British Mu- seum, and of this a woodcut is given as being the oldest known English massing chalice. The wood- cut would do almost equally well for one of the coffin chalices found at York Minster, which is attributed to the year 1250. (See No. 2.) Something, too, may be gathered as to the fashion of the chalices of these centuries from wills and mortuaries. Nicholas de Farnham in 1257 bequeaths to the monks of Durham, “ j calix cum lapidibus pretiosis in pede ; ” and John, Earl of Warrenne, in 1347 another such to Durham Cathedral. It is described in his will as “ unum calicem magni valoris de auro purissimo cum multis lapidibus pretiosis insertis.” In the inventory of the goods of a bishop of Durham who died in 1381, his chalices are mentioned as follows: — “j calicem magnum argenteum et deauratum in cujus pede est ymago Domini crucifixi et super nodum ejusdem Scuta armorum ejusdem Episcopi cum iij No. 1. — PEWTER COFFIN CHALICE AND PATEN. 13 CENT. Surrey Archaeological Collections , Vol. III. p. 348. M [CHAP. IX 162 Old English Plate . leunculis argenteis. It™ j cuppam infra deanratam et extra aneme- latam pro Eukaristia.” Stephen Lescrop, Archdeacon of Richmond, makes a bequest in 1418, of “ unum chalescuppe cum longo pede de argento deauratum et coopertum cum j knop in sumitate.” Proof could be adduced that chalices were cups of a somewhat fixed and well-known form, from the fact that drinking-vessels were some- times described as “ chalyswyse,” or “ ad modum calicis factum.” NO. 2. — CHALICE IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 13 CENT. Sir R. de Roos mentions in his will, dated 1892, “ unum ciphum qui vocatur chaliscopp ; ” an almost identical entry is to he found in the Bristol Orphan Book in the course of the will of John Stoke, a burgess of Bristol, proved in 1898 ; whilst among a number of articles of table- plate bought by Edward III. in 1366 of Thomas Hesseyhis goldsmith, and presented to the Constable of Flanders and other personages as gifts from the King, was “ un coup de chalice endorr’ et esmV’ Mr. Octavius Morgan says as to the form of the pre -Reformation English chalice, “ A chalice consists of three parts — the cup or howl ; the stem, which in its middle swelled into a bulb called the knop ; and the foot. The bowl itself was usually quite plain, in order that it might be more easily kept pure and clean. The stem, knop and foot were frequently ornamented with enamels, or chased work repre CHAP. IX.] Chalices . 163 senting the emblems of the Passion or other sacred subjects ; and on the foot, which was usually made hexagonal, to prevent the chalice rolling when laid upon its side to drain, there was always a cross which the priest kept towards himself at the time of celebration.” In the thirteenth century the chalices seem to have been short and low, and the howl wide and shallow, as exemplified by the celebrated chalice of St. Eemy, once at Kheims, but removed to the Bibliotheque Nationale, which is considered to be of the time of St. Louis, as also by the chalices of silver and pewter which have been found in the tombs of the priests of that century. In the fourteenth century they were made taller, the bowls assumed a decidedly conical form, being narrow at the bottom, and having the sides sloping straight out- wards. In the fifteenth century they were usually broader at the bottom, with the sides still forming part of a cone, like that at Net- tlecomhe, co. Somerset, till a form altogether hemi- spherical was assumed, of which a fine chalice at Leo- minster, figured in A rchceo- logia, vol. xxxv. p. 489, is a noble specimen. Of this type also is one at Comb Pyne in Devonshire. The chalice mentioned by Mr. Morgan as at Nettlecombe, together with those now preserved at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, at Jurhy in the Isle of Man, and at Wylye, Wilts, have been selected as illustrations for this volume, chiefly because of their beauty and merit, hut also for the reason that they are all four hall-marked, and their dates therefore approximately known. Two are given in outline profile, and the other two in perspective. The Nettlecombe Chalice and its Paten were brought to light by Mr. Octavius Morgan some years ago, and are of the greatest interest, not only from their beauty and perfect condition, but from their antiquity, for they are older than any other hall-marked example of No. 3. — CHALICE (1479) AT NETTLECOMBE, SOMERSET. [CHAP. IX. 164 Old English Plate . English goldsmith’s work.' They are described by Mr. Morgan as follows : — * “ The Chalice and Paten are of silver gilt. Their forms are elegant ; both were originally ornamented with enamels, and although they have been in use for many centuries, they have sustained but little injury. The chalice stands very nearly six inches high. The bowl is in form between a cone and a hemisphere, that is, the bottom is broad and round, whilst the sides con- tinue straight and conical, a form which is rather indicative of its date. This bowl is supported on a hexagonal stem di- vided into two portions by the knop, which is a beautiful piece of gold- smith’s work formed by the projection from the angles of the stem of six short square arms, each terminating in a lion’s mask, or in proper heraldic lan- guage ‘ a leopard’s head,’ and having the intermediate spaces tilled up with elegant flowing Gothic tracery of pierced open work. The lower part of the stem rests on a curved haxagonal foot, being united to it by Gothic mouldings, and the foot terminates, in an upright basement moulding, which is enriched with a small vertically reeded band. One of the six compartments of the foot was ornamented, as is usual in ancient chalices, by a repre- sentation of the Crucifixion. The metal of this compartment has been cut out, and a silver plate engraved with the Crucifixion has been rudely riveted in. This silver plate is, I think, the original work, and it was formerly enamelled — for it would probably have been found easier and more convenient to prepare the enamel on a small separate plate and then fix it in its place, than to have subjected the No. 4. — PATEN (1479) AT NETTLECOMBE, SOMERSET. * This description originally appeared in Archccologia, vol. xlii. 405, and was accom- panied by coloured lithographs of the chalice and paten of the actual size of the originals, from which the engravings prepared for this volume have been carefully reduced. chap, ix.] Chalices . 165 whole chalice to the heat of the enameller’s furnace, which milst have been the case had the enamel been done on the foot itself. The silver plate is deeply engraved, or rather the metal is tooled out to receive transparent enamel in the style of the work of the fourteenth or the beginning of the fifteenth century, and small traces of the enamel with which it has been filled may still be discovered. It will be seen at once that the design was made for the place from the peculiar attitude of the figure, the arms being drawn up over the head, to adapt it to the form of the compartment. “ The paten is 4 | inches in diameter with a narrow moulded edge and a brim like an ordinary plate, within which is sunk a six-lobed depres- sion. The centre points from which the workman formed the lobes are still visible, and the spandrels be- tween the lobes are filled with a small radiating ornament as is usual in similar early patens, which are not unfrequently met with. I11 the centre is a still further depression, in which has been inserted from the back a small silver plate having in transparent enamel sunk in the metal, a representation of the vernicle, or face of our Saviour surrounded by a cruciform nimbus. It fortunately remains perfect. This central depression with an inserted plate of enamel is very unusual, the surface of patens being usually made as smooth as possible. The back of this small plate is gilt and en- graved with the sacred monogram (see woodcut) in black letter of the fifteenth century.” c • Such patens were usually made to match the chalices with which they were used, and the two were sometimes called “a pair of chalice” or “chalice with his paten,” in old inventories of church goods* The No. 5. — BISHOP pox’s GOLD CHALICE (1507) AT CORriTS CHRISTI COLLEGE, OXFORD. i66 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. depression of the paten often exactly fitted into the top of its chalice if placed upon it. The date of this chalice is almost certainly 1479, though from the want of examples it was difficult for a long time to positively assign the date-letter which it plainly hears to that year.- Tliis letter was formerly supposed to stand for the year 1459, hut the many points of resemblance between this and the gold chalice given by Bishop Fox to Corpus Cliristi College, Oxford, which is un- doubtedly of the year 1507, seem to point conclusively to the year 1479, though to judge from the enamelling alone, it might have been of a somewhat earlier date. It will be seen from the engravings of Bishop Fox’s chalice (No. 5) and the chalices .at Jurby and Wylye (Nos. 6 & 7), that they form a regular series, the cable-like edges to CHAP. IX.] Chalices . 167 the stem and the engraving on the foot of the chalice of 1507 giving an intermediate point between the very beautiful simplicity of the earlier Nettlecombe chalice and the later ones the dates of which are No. 7. — CHALICE (1525) AT WILYE, WILTS. 1521 and 1525. Much of Mr. Octavius Morgan’s description of the Nettlecombe chalice is equally applicable to the other three examples. The Wylye chalice bears all the ornamentation of the older ones, and in addition an elaborately engraved inscription on a belt running round i68 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. the bowl of the chalice, and the same on the rim of the paten. This inscription is not unusual. “A chalice with a patent gilt graven with Calicem Salutaris weing xxi. onz.,” is mentioned amongst the gilt plate belonging to Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, at his death in almost the very year in which the Wylye chalice was made. Would that many such remained ; but these, with hardly a score more, are all that have come to the knowledge of the writer, after years of enquiry, assisted by the researches of many friends and fellow labourers, amongst whom must be specially mentioned Mr. T. M. Fallow and the Assistant Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries, Mr. W. H. St. John Hope, F.S.A. It will be desirable to give a list of these, as nearly as may be in chronological order, with their approximate dates. They are as follows : — British Museum (Berwick St. James, Wilts) . . middle of the 13th century. Hamstall Bidware, Staffordshire. 15th century. Goatland, Yorkshire, early 15th century. Little Faringdon, Oxfordshire . Nettlecombe, Somerset . . . 1470 Hinderwell, Yorkshire Leominster, Herefordshire . . . Claughton, Lancashire Hornby Roman Catholic Church, Lancashire . . ... Old Hutton, Westmoreland Berwick, Yorkshire . . . . Bacton, Herefordshire Comb Pyne, Devonshire . . . Brasenose College, Oxford (2) . . 1498 West Drayton, Middlesex . . . 1507 Blaston St. Giles, Leicestershire Corpus Christi College, Oxford . . 1507 Chewton Mendip, Somerset . .1511 Leyland Roman Catholic Church, Lancashire 1518 Jurby, Isle of Man .... 1521 St. Sampson, Guernsey . . . Lord Hatherton’s .... Wylye, Wiltshire 1525 Trinity College, Oxford . . . 1527 Enough is said elsewhere about the chalices at the British Museum, at Nettlecombe, Corpus College, Oxford, Wylye, and Trinity College, Oxford. Of the others, those from Claughton to Comb Pyne inclu- sive form a group of beautiful examples, having much good work and interesting features, including the addition of a small knop or toe at each angle of the foot. One of the first discovered of these was the chalice at Old Hutton, found by Miss Ellen K. Goodwin in the course of examining the church plate of the Deanery of Kendal, for publica- tion in the Cumberland and Westmoreland Antiquarian and Archaeo- logical Society’s Transactions. It was the only piece of pre-Reform a- tion church-plate remaining in the diocese of Carlisle. A second well-marked group consists of those which close the list, beginning with the Corpus College, and ending with the Trinity College chalice, but excluding the Chewton Mendip cup, which is of somewhat peculiar shape and ornamentation, and has a circular foot. This latest group has lobed, instead of six-sided or mullet- shaped feet. All the other chalices have mullet- shaped feet except the CHAP. IX.] Patens . 169 thirteenth century example now in the British Museum. This has the circular foot proper to the earliest type of chalice, including the coffin chalices of which so many have been brought to light in carrying out modern restoration work. The beautiful example at WyJye was discovered by Mr. J. E. Nightingale, F.S.A., who describes it as follows : — “ It is of silver gilt and in excellent preser- vation ; 6| inches in height, stem and base hexagonal. Some of the ornamentation corresponds with the Trinity College chalice at Oxford. It has the same cable ornament at the angles of the stem, and the same Gothic open embattled work at the foot of it, but not the open tracery work between, the cables. The knop is similar to that of the Nettlecombe chalice, except that it has human heads instead of lions’ heads ; the moulding of the base, too, is like the Nettlecombe cup, and likewise the form of the bowl, which is not so globular as that of the Trinity College example. It has an inscription both on bowl and foot, and the usual crucifix on the base ; the lettering on the cup is small Gothic, and that on the base in capitals of the early ojin sixteenth century type.” The hall-mark is a Lombardic capital MM and will give us the year 1525 as the date of this interesting cup. It is as 1 70 ' Old English Plate . [ chap ., ix . close to the Trinity College, Oxford, chalice in point of date, as it is in the style of its ornamentation. Patens of ancient date are more numerous, and a good many are still in use. Many of the earlier ones much resemble the Nettle- combe example, but are with- out the enamel. That at Trinity College, Oxford, is one of the most elaborate (No. 8). It belongs to the chalice so exactly resembling the one at Wylye. Some sixty or eighty pre-Beformation patens are now known, nearly all of the end of the fifteenth century or the early part of the sixteenth. The latest is at St. Edmund’s, Salis- bury, and is of the year 1588. The hall-marked patens are : Nettlecombe, Somerset 1479, vernicle. Stow Longa, Hunts. . 1491, „ Shirley, Derbyshire . 1493, „ Cossey, Norfolk . . 1496, „ Happisbrough, Norfolk 1504, „ C. C. 0., Oxford . . 1507, „ West Drayton, Mid- dlesex . . ,, „ Hockham Parva, Nor- folk . . . 1509, „ Chewton Mendip, So- merset . . . 1511, agnus Dei. Heworth, Durham . 1514, vernicle. Rev. Thos. Staniforth’s 1517, „ Ilamsterley, Durham .1519, „ Great Waltham, Essex 1521, „ Trinity College, Oxford 1527, ,, Gissing, Norfolk . . 1530, „ St. Edmund’s, Salis- bury . . . 1533, „ No. 9.— COMMUNION CUP (1570) AT CIRENCESTER. Besides the paten, a spoon sometimes appertained to the ancient massing chalice. A chalice is mentioned in a will of 1482, as “calicem sanctificatam cum patena et cocliari eidem calici pertinente.” The use of this chalice spoon is told us by an entry in the York Minster fabric rolls, 28 Dec. 1370, which adds to the mention of a silver gilt spoon that it was “ ad proporcionandum vinum sive aquam pro calice magni altaris.” r.tioaas CHAP. IX.] Elizabethan Communion Cups. 171 This brings ns to Protestant times and the new form of com- munion cup introduced in the reign of Elizabeth, or rather of Edward VI. Cups of the earlier reign are seldom to be found ; those known to the author are one at St. Lawrence Jewry, which is of 1548-9, one of 1550-1 at Bride- kirk, Cumberland, two at St. Margaret’s, Westminster, an- other at Hunstanton in Norfolk, and a sixth at Totnes, the last four being all of them of the year 1551-2; and they all so much resemble the engraving we have given (No. 9) of the communion cups of 1570 still preserved at Cirencester, that more need not be said about them. Their peculiarity is their dotted ornament and their stem with gadrooned flange close up under the bowl. The Ciren- cester pair no doubt owe their early fashion to the fact that though they are themselves of Elizabethan date, they were made by a silversmith who had been much employed upon such work in the time of King Edward VI., and who continued, as it seems, to use his original shop pattern long afterwards. They are plain standing cups with conical stem, as shown, and without knops. Their large size adapted them for the use of the whole congre- gation, now that in 1547 the ad- ministration of the Communion in both kinds was restored ac- No. 10. — COMMUNION CUP AND PATEN-COVER (1576), AT CHRISTCHURCH, CO. MONMOUTH. Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. 172 cording to the practice of the early Church, and in this respect they are a great contrast to the chalices they replaced. There is fortunately no lack of examples of the Elizabethan communion cup. They are found everywhere, and of the same form, and bearing the same style of ornamentation, from one end of England to the other. (No. 10.) There are sixteen within a walk of Ciren- cester, and as many in one county as another. Mr. Morgan has given the following account of them : — “The chalice still consisted of the same parts — bowl, stem, and foot — though I have known two instances in small parishes where the chalices consist of the cup only, without stem or foot. The stem, although altered in form and character, still swells out in the middle into a small knob, or the rudiments of one, and is occasionally ornamented with small bands of a lozenge-shaped ornament, or some other such simple pattern, and the foot is invariably round, instead of indented or angular. The form of the cup, however, is altogether changed, and instead of being a shallow wide bowl, it is elongated into the form of an inverted truncated cone slightly bell-shaped. The form of the paten is also much changed, the sunk part of the platter is often considerably deepened, the brim narrowed, and thereon is fixed a rim or edge by which it is made, when inverted, to fit on the cup as a cover, whilst a foot is added to it which serves also as a handle to the cover, as though it were intended to place the wine in the chalice and cover it with the paten- cover until the administration of the Sacra- ment, when the cover would be removed and used as .a paten for hold- ing the bread. On the bottom of the foot of the paten was a silver plate which almost always bears the date when it was made, and the name of the parish to which it belongs. The ornamentation on all these chalices and paten-covers, as they may be called, is invariably the same ; it consists simply of an engraved band Tound the body of the cup and on the top of the cover formed by two narrow fillets which interlace or cross each other with a particular curvature in every instance the same, the space between them being occupied by a scroll of foliage, and this ornament is marked by a total absence of letters, monograms, emblems, or figures of any kind. It is curious how this exact uniformity of shape and ornament w T as so universally adopted, unless there had been some regulation or standard pattern to go by, but I have not been able to find any such, to guide the makers.” To this it may be added, that some years ago, before much attention was paid to hall-marks, a silversmith assured the present writer that these cups w 7 ere all made by order, and issued one to every parish by government under an Act of Parliament; it is, however, hardly chap, ix.] Elizabethan Communion Cups . 173 necessary to say now that no such Act can be found. They were made by provincial as well as London goldsmiths ; plenty were made at York, Exeter, and Norwich, and there are almost as many different makers’ marks upon them as there are cups themselves. In Yorkshire and in Worcestershire they are of 1570 or 1571 ; in Norfolk five years earlier, and in Gloucestershire and the west of England about as much later. No two again are exactly alike in size or finish, there is everything from the tiny cup of some village church weighing no more than five or six ounces and destitute of all ornament, up to a tall vessel a foot high, holding nearly a quart of wine, and fully ornamented as in the engraving, some few having a second belt around the cup. It may be remarked that both the Norwich and Exeter gold- smiths had patterns of their own for the bowls ; at Norwich they were made wider, shal- lower, and with straighter sides than in London and elsewhere in England, and they often bore the name of the parish en- communion cup ( 1566 ), Norwich pattern. graved around them instead of the ornament described by Mr. Morgan. A good idea of the Norwich style is given by the cup formerly at Baveningham, co. Norfolk, but since in the collection of Prof. Church (No. 11). The inscription round the band is THE CYPPE PTENYNG TO BANYNGHAM. Another bears FOB THE TOWNE OF CASTYN, 1567, and a third on the paten-handle THE TOYNE OF AYLSHAM, 1568. Those made at Exeter are, without exception, very handsome vessels, quite as tall and deep as the London patterns given in our engravings, and the bowls vase- shaped, larger at the top than the bottom, the sides just at the rim turning straight up for about a quarter of an inch rather than forming a lip. Many of them are richly gilt or parcel gilt, and engraved more often than not with a quadruple belt interlaced in 174 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. the usual manner, instead of the ordinary double one, and elaborately finished. In Worcestershire a number of the cups noted by Arch- deacon Lea have stems of the Edward VI. pattern or a modification of it. These have usually a maker’s mark only, probably that of a local man; hut several of them are dated 1571. Except for such small differences and local peculiarities, they are all so alike in shape and style, that it is indeed somewhat wonderful, as Mr. Morgan remarks, that no authority or direction for their formation has ever been found. Burnet and Strype, the Constitutions and Canons of the Church, the Acts and Proceedings in Convocation, the Documentary Annals of the Deformation, the Injunctions, Declarations, and Orders, were all searched by Mr. Morgan without finding any specific direction that would account for the extraordinary uniformity of shape and pattern which could hardly have been the result of the taste or caprice of churchwardens or silversmiths. To this long list may he added the Statute Book, the Registers of the Privy Council, and every other likely record, which have all since been searched in vain. There is one suggestion left, that some regulation on the subject, though unrecorded, may have emanated from the Convocation held in London in 1562, at which many important matters concerning the doctrine, articles, rites and discipline of the Church of England were settled. The earliest cup of this fashion is of the year 1558. The same pattern found favour from this time to about the middle of the next century, but in examples of a later date than 1600 the engraved belt is usually wanting, and the bowls are perhaps rather straighter sided. There are good specimens of these at the Temple Church made in 1609, and a pair of rather plainer finish at Hackney Church of the year 1687. All these are about nine inches high. Between 1610 and 1650 the cup is often found shaped something like the letter V, and supported by a baluster stem. An engraving (No. 12) is given of an example of this kind and date, together with other pewter communion vessels of the period, which are much like those made of more precious metal at the same time. That sad historical relic, the chalice in which King Charles I. received his last communion on the morning of his execution, is of this fashion, and was made in 1629. It is preserved at Welbeck. Of the Commonwealth period, are found a few communion cups, such as those at Rochester Cathedral, which seem to have been fashioned after the better pre-Reformation models. They have the six-sided foot with cherub-heads at the points, but the bowls are deeper and straighter than those of the Gothic period. From about the time of the Restoration a ruder fashion prevailed ; CHAP. IX.] Communion Cups. 175 many cups are then found of great size, with straight sides having somewhat of a lip, and mounted on a plain circular stem and foot, wholly unrelieved by any ornament, save that the stem perhaps swells out at its centre into a simple boss or ring as plain as the rest of it. The paten-cover fitting on is still found as on those at Westminster Abbey, dated 1660, and many other places. Another pattern in vogue then and later, had an even ruder stem and foot all in one, it being merely a truncated cone somewhat of the No. 12. — PEWTER COMMUNION VESSELS, CIRCA 1640, shape of the bowl of an Elizabethan communion cup turned upside down, and attached to the bottom of the cup. There are examples of them dated 1661 at St. Margaret’s, Westminster, and they are not at all uncommon ; from this time the paten-cover is often wanting. One other form of seventeenth century communion cup must be mentioned. A fine example of this is at Ashby-de-la-Zouche, an engraving (No. 13) of which is given from an original drawing furnished by the kindness of the vicar. It was given in 1676, and resembles, in general form, an undated and not so highly ornamented cup used in Lambeth Palace chapel. Somewhat similar ones dated 1687 are at St. Mary’s, Lambeth. 176 [CIIAP. IX. Old English Plate. Before we leave tlie sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, note must not he omitted of other cups of quite exceptional form which are occasionally found, some of great excellence ; the,se have, no doubt, No. 13.— COMMUNION CUP (1676) AT ASHBY-DE-LA-ZOUCHE. been originally secular drinking cups, but since devoted by the piety and liberality of their owners to more sacred purposes. Perhaps the most beautiful of all such cups is one at Cirencester, made in 1585, and in all probability for the unfortunate Queen Anne Boleyn. An engraving of this is given (No. 14). It is not known at what time it came into the possession of the churchwardens of Ciren- CHAP. IX.] 1 77 Cups used as Chalices. cester, but it is not improbable that it was one of the royal New Year’s Day presents, made by Anne Boleyn’s daughter, Queen Elizabeth, after the fashion of those days, to her physician, Dr. Bichard Master (to whom the lands of the Abbey of Cirencester were granted in 1565), and by him given to the parish with which his descendants have ever since been connected. Another very ancient cup at Gatcombe, Isle of Wight, bears the hall-mark probably of the year 1540. (No. 15.) A fine hanap at Watford in Hert- fordshire, is of the year 1561. Sir John Maclean notes a very good one, dated 1576, at St. Mabyn’s, Cornwall. It is some 13 inches high, and has a cover surmounted by a boy nude hold- ing a shield, both bowl and cover en- graved in arabesque style with birds and foliage. Kensington parish church li t I ff ! has a tall standing cup of 1599, the 'm bowl ornamented with escallop shells « in bold repousse-work ; and at Huck- nall Torkard is a very similar hanap, of about 1610, in character much like the Edmonds’ Cup of the Car- penters’ Company, of which an en- graving is given in the next chapter ; but the steeple is in this case want- ing, or more probably has been broken off. A magnificent cup of 1614 at Odcombe, Som., another of 1617 at ^ ^ Bodmin, and a third of 1619 at Linton, Kent, are as fine as that at Carpenters’ Hall. Simple beaker No. 14.— cup (1535), with cover sur- cups are m use at Llanfyllm, N. bam™,* used as a chalice Wales, and at Armatliwaite, in at cirencester. Cumberland. These are ot the years 1598 and 1609 respectively. Such cups were popular also for secular use at this period. (See No. 79.) * The Boleyn badge was a crowned falcon | ligible without explanation, and makes the bearing a sceptre in the dexter claw and sceptre, the upper portion of which is now having a mount of lilies growing in front of broken off in the case of the cup at Ciren- its breast. The above engraving gives the cester, too like a dagger, lilies rather too much in profile to be intel- 178 Old English Plate . [chap. ix. Last of all comes an ordinary two-liandled fluted porringer, like No. 83, Chap. X. Made in 1708, it lias done duty as a chalice at a village church in Gloucestershire ever since. It is interesting to find examples, and fine examples too, of each successive fashion of secular drinking-cup amongst the ancient posses- sions of our parish churches. It may, perhaps, he thought by some at the present day inappropriate to use such vessels for the sacred purposes to which their former owners have dedicated them, but surely they should be carefully treasured and pre- served instead of exchanged, as they too often are, for articles of modern de- sign that cannot be thought of without a shudder of horror. Less suitable they may seem to a few for their present use than such models of mediaeval art as the chalices at Nettlecombe or at Ox- ford, hut they have an interest and a value of their own that can never attach to the brand-new vessels decora- ted with sham jewels and nineteenth century filigree-work, that are too often obtained in exchange for them. At the commencement of the eigh- teenth century, cups were made very upright, much like those of 1660 at Westminster Abbey, but narrower and straighter, and always perfectly plain. It is said that Queen Anne presented most of the American churches of that day with silver altar vessels ; some of these are preserved still, and it is much to be hoped that many more examples will be found sooner or later. There is even nowin use, or was in 1861, the hundredth anniversary of the foundation of the church, at Christ Church, Cambridge, Mass., a silver paten, cup and flagon bearing the date 1694, originally part of a service presented by King William and Queen Mary “ for the use of their Majesties’ Chappell in New England,” that is, the King’s Chapel, Boston. This set seems to have been given by the Church to Governor Hutchinson in exchange for a more valuable set in 1772, and by him divided equally between Christ Church, Cambridge, and St. Paul’s Church, Newburyport.* * Note kindly communicated by Rev. H. W. Tucker, M.A., Secretary S.P.G. No. 15. — CUP USED AS A CHALICE AT GATCOMBE, ISLE OF WIGHT. (Half scale.) CHAP. IX.] Patens . 179 A set of communion plate given in 1711 by Queen Anne “ to her Indian Chapel of Onondawgas,” is now in use at St. Peter’s Church, Albany, N.Y. And a silver service sent to Grace Church, Jamaica, in Long Island, by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel,* in the year 1704, is still in existence there engraved “Ex dono Societatis pro promovendo Evangelis in partibus transmarinis, 1704,” and the record of the grant of money with which it was bought is to he traced in the Journal of the Society on Nov. 17tli in that year. It was made by John Wisdome of London. Plate of the year 1708 remains at St. George’s Church, Hempstead, Long Island, and at St. Peter’s Church, West- chester, N.Y., both cups being made by John Eastt. The service at Trinity Church, N.Y., is of the following year and by Francis Garthorne. The plate at Christ Church, Boston, Mass., was given by King George II. in 1733, and was made in that year by Joseph Allen, of St. Swithin’s Lane. Again Trinity Church, Boston, was given plate by the same sovereign in 1742. This was made in 1741 by the same silversmith as the last. Modern chalices may he seen in use at St. Paul’s Cathedral, and at n 2 * See note on preceding page. i8o Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. Kensington parish church, to mention places that are easily accessible, and these may be usefully compared with the illustrations of older chalices given in this chapter by those who are interested in such matters. So much for chalices, but a few words must be added to carry down the history of patens. The paten usual in the seventeenth century was not fitted to the cup, hut was a plain circular salver on a central circular conical foot like the stem of the rudest of the communion cups, and that of the eighteenth century was a plain plate. In fact, everything may he found from a plain but solid plate, about the size and shape of a dinner-plate, down to a small domestic waiter, standing on the three usual small feet, and made of plated metal. As an illustration of the patens of the seventeenth century, a wood- cut (No. 16 ) is given of an unusually fine one at St. Cuthbert’s, York, by the kindness of the Yorkshire Archfeological Society. It affords also a good example of the stiff feather mantling that so often sur- rounds the coats of arms engraved on plates of the Charles II. period. After this no attention was paid to art in ecclesiastical matters, and it can only be said that the church plate of the last century was well suited to the churches of the period. Fortunately, older churches in most cases treasured the better plate acquired at an earlier period, and well would it be if this were still so, and fewer Elizabethan communion cups were seen in the shop-windows of the modern silversmith. Many of them are made of the very same silver as the more ancient chalices which they replaced, vessels that had, perchance, belonged to their parishes from time immemorial. It is to be feared that they are constantly parted with for the mere price of the silver of which they are made, by those who are in ignorance, or are regardless, of the curious historical associations which surround these ancient and inter- esting relics of the Reformation period. FLAGONS. The earliest of these are of the reign of Elizabeth, and succeeding as they did the phials or cruets of earlier days, one of which was for wine and the other for water, they are usually found in pairs, although a single vessel of the kind would have been all that was actually necessary, even to bring to the church the larger quantity of wine that was now used. Tankard flagons of an Elizabethan pattern with tapering sides that will be found described under the title Tankards later on, are in use as communion flagons, one at Teffont Ewyas, Wilts, and the other at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, but there is nothing to identify their fashion especially with ecclesiastical uses. CHAP. IX.] Flagons ; 1S1 We may, therefore, pass on to the very early pair at Cirencester church (No. 17), which were made in 1576, and supply us with a distinctive form of flagon which was used till about 1615. Several examples of them have been found at intermediate dates; a pair at St. Mar- garet’s, Westmin- ster, are of 1583 \ and at Rendcombe in Gloucestershire there are flagons of the same shape or- namented round the bowls with engraved belts of the usual Elizabethan com - munion-cup pattern. They are of the year 1592. One of 1604 is at Salisbury Cathedral. Those of St. George’s Chapel, Windsor, are of 1613. It is curious to note that there are no less than seven or eight large flagons of this exact shape and of English make, amongst the trea- sures of the Czar and of the Patriarch of Moscow in the No. 17. — COMMUNION FLAGON (1576) AT CIRENCESTER. Kremlin. The Rus- sian examples are ornamented all over in flat repousse work, and are of various dates from 1596 to 1612. Flagons were probably not so invariably made of silver as were chalices. The churchwardens of Wing, co. Bucks, are found in 1576, paying u for a tynne wyne bottell for the churche, xviijd.,” and in 1605 the authorities of Leverton ijs. vi d. “ for a puter communion pott.” 1 82 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. The word “ pott ’’ will remind ns of the Canons of 1603, by which (Canon 20) the wine was required to be brought to the communion table in “ a clean and sweet standing pot or stoup of pewter if not of purer metal.” From this time the “ round-bellied” flagons, as they are called in a MS. inventory of the plate of St. George’s Chapel, disappear, and the usual tankard pattern comes in which has ever since been used and is so familiar. The earliest of these tall tankard-flagons known to the writer are a pair quite plain, save for one or two small hands of moulding, at Brasenose College, Oxford. These are of 1608. Next come a pair at Salisbury Cathedral of 1610, given by John Barnston, Canon of Salisbury, and of Brasenose College, Oxford. Possibly as both pair are by the same maker, both were presented by Barnston. Following these are two of the same year, 1618, a plain one belonging to Gray’s Inn Chapel, and a beautiful specimen ornamented with belts and scrolls of strap-work, the property of the parish of Bodmin : a very similar one to the last at Kensington Church, London, was made in 1619. The illustrations later under the article on Tankards, of tall tankards at Norwich and Bristol, give a good idea of the church flagon-tankards of this period. Later than this, and to the present day, they are all of the shape and character of the pewter example shown on page 175, which is of 1640 or thereabouts. Yery occasion- ally exceptions occur, as in the case of those at Canterbury Cathedral, which are of a jug shape with swelling howls on short stems or feet, and have spouts, their lids being surmounted by crosses. They are ornamented with flat applique silver ornamentation of the kind some- times called by amateurs “ cut card work,” for want of a better name, and are of the year 1664. The jug- shaped flagon is occasionally found in the eighteenth century. A pair at Durham Cathedral, which are of the year 1766, are ornamented with flower-sprays in repousse work, and are not very unlike the coffee-pot of the same period in shape and general style, except that a short lip at the rim replaces the long spout inserted lower down in the bowl, which would be proper to a coffee-pot. The word “flagon” seems to have been always appropriated to a vessel intended to hold wine, and has therefore been continued to these communion vessels, which would otherwise be more appropriately called “ tankards,” or “ pots,” as in the language of the Canons of 1603. The very derivation of the word connects it with “ flask,” and with the travelling bottles, or costrels, suspended by a cord or chain, similar to what are now called “pilgrims’ bottles.” In England the CHAr. IX.] Alms-Dishes or Basins . 103 wine was brought to the communion table in the sort of vessels described above ; but it is a curious fact that at this very day, at All Souls’ College, Oxford, the flagons used to contain the wine for conse- cration at the Sacrament, are two very ancient large silver-gilt flasks or pilgrims’ bottles, having chains to which the stoppers are attached. It is said that they were spared at the Keformation, as having nothing popish about them. They are of foreign, and, from the goldsmith’s marks, almost certainly of French, workmanship ; their precise date is unknown, but from their general character, and particularly that of their stoppers, they are probably of the beginning of the sixteenth century. ALMS-DISHES OR BASINS. These in early days may have been of various forms, such as ships, but were more often basins. The Wardrobe accounts of 1296 (24 Edward I.) mention “ j navis argenti cum pede p’ elemos’,” and in the time of Edward III. occurs an entry, “ una magna olla p’ elemosinar’,” but these were probably articles of table plate intended for the recep- tion of broken meat to be given to the poor. Another such alms-dish of gold, called the “ Tvgre,” and standing upon a golden bear ornamented with rubies and pearls, is mentioned in Palgrave’s State Inventories at the year 1481 (9 Henry VI.). This appears from other entries to have been like that of 1296, a ship, and was pledged over and over again for loans of money. Basins in great number, whatever they may have been used for, are mentioned in the church inventories of 1552 and other years, but those that are now found in our cathedrals and churches are not ancient ones. A large plain gilt alms-dish at Lambeth Palace Chapel, of the year 1685, is the oldest known to the writer. Next to that comes a curious fluted dish bearing punched ornamentation in spirals, dated 1639, and belonging to the parish of Bermondsey. A plain dish, that might serve for either alms-dish or paten, part of the Gray’s Inn Chapel plate, is of the same year. Later ones are always plain plates or dishes of silver or silver gilt, differing from one another only in size, some few having a coat of arms engraved on the centre or rim. Hardly any of them are of earlier date than 1660, and few are as old as that. There is a fine large dish of 1684 ornamented with repousse work at Westminster Abbey, and a pair of plainer ones, of about the same date, engraved with the well-known heraldic bearing of a cross between five martlets, the coat assigned to Edward the Confessor. 184 Old English Plate. [CHAP. IX. CANDLESTICKS. Those used before the Reformation were usually in pairs, and made of latten, or of copper gilt, often they were of silver. Such a pair are found amongst the plate of Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, natural son of Henry VIII., in 1527, described as follows : — “Pair of candelstikkes chaced wrethen for an aulter, weing lxxviij. oz. iii. qts. Another pair, lxiij. oz. iij. qts.” They have all entirely disappeared, those which were of intrinsic value in the time of Edward VI., and those made of commoner materials were destroyed as “ monuments of superstition ” in the early years of Elizabeth. Pricket candlesticks, or candlesticks with an upright spike upon which to place a large candle, are found amongst the plate of our cathedrals, but are seldom older than 1660, and still seldomer of any artistic interest. Candlesticks such as these are at Rochester, Canter- bury, Gloucester, and other places. The Rochester examples are the earliest known to be still in use, being of 1658. A very fine pair of chased candlesticks of great size on tripod stands and of good work manship belong to Westminster Abbey, but these are somewhat later, being of the year 1684. Those at Exeter Cathedral are fluted columns on pedestals, and were made in 1681. Good candlesticks of more modern design, ornamented with fluted work, chased flowers, and the like, may be seen at Durham. These were made in 1767. The dates of all these specimens suggest the concluding remark that little or no communion plate of any kind is found in our cathe- drals older than the Restoration period. Probably cathedrals were more exposed to spoliation during the Civil War than parish churches, which could better deny the possession of any treasure worth taking ; at all events nothing of their earlier plate now remains. CHAPTER X. DECORATIVE AND DOMESTIC PLATE. INTRODUCTION — EFFECT OF THE WARS OF THE ROSES — PROSPERITY OF THE SIX- TEENTH CENTURY — GREAT DESTRUCTION OF OLD PLATE AT VARIOUS TIMES — GOLD PLATE — OBSOLETE VESSELS — SPOONS — MAZERS — SALTS— STONEWARE JUGS — EWERS, BASINS, AND SALVERS — STANDING CUPS AND HANAPS — TANKARDS — SMALLER CUPS OF VARIOUS KINDS— PLATES — FORKS — MON- TEITHS — CANDLESTICKS, SCONCES, ETC. — TOILET SERVICES — CASTERS AND CRUET-STANDS — TEA AND COFFEE SERVICES, KETTLES, ETC. — CAKE-BASKETS AND EPERGNES— MACES AND OARS— RACING BELLS, ETC. Passing from ecclesiastical to secular plate, it needs no apology to commence a chapter which is intended to form part of a practical guide to the plate-collector, with the period to which the oldest extant specimens belong. It may be said at once that the Wars of the Roses were to secular plate what the events of the next century were to the treasures of the Church. Domestic plate, of an earlier date than the reign of Henry VII., is as scarce as pre-Reformation cliurch-plate. The known examples may be almost reckoned on the fingers, and none of them are hall-marked except the Nettlecombe Chalice and Paten, and the Anathema Cup at Pembroke College, Cambridge. They comprise, the few chalices and patens of which particulars have been given in the preceding chapter ; several mazers which will be mentioned later ; about half-a-dozen drinking vessels of note ; and a salt or two. The cups are the Lynn Cup, the Horn at Queen’s College, Oxford, the Foundress’ Cup at Christ’s College, Cambridge, and a Cocoa-nut Cup at New College, Oxford. Almost the only salt is the Huntsman or Giant Salt at All Souls’ College, Oxford. But in prosperous Tudor times the goldsmith had once more become a dependent of no mean consideration in the households of the great. The will of Katherine of Arragon mentions her gold- smith, to whom she gives a year’s wages, and one Robert Amadal held a similar office in the domestic establishment of Cardinal Wolsey. Very early in the sixteenth century an English gentleman’s house of the better sort would have been found well supplied with silver Old English Plate . [chap. X. 186 plate. Sir John Heron, Knt., Treasurer of the Chamber of King Henry VIII., bequeaths to his wife in 1525, “ray daily usual plate being in my buttery, that is to say, three saltes silv’ with a cover, xxifi of silver spones, two standing cuppes with ij covers gilt, three Gobletes with a cover and ij white holies of silver oon pounced and another playn.” The same testator had more covered cups, covered salts, ewers and basins, and other things besides to leave to his children ; hut the terms of the bequest to his wife give a good idea of what was thought necessary for ordinary domestic use in such a house as his at that period. By the middle of the reign of Queen Elizabeth the wealth and luxury of the country had been on the increase for almost a century, and an extract from the Description of England, by William Harri- son, Chaplain to Lord Cobham, which is prefixed to Holingshed’s Chronicles, will supply us with a convenient preface. Writing in 1586 he quaintly comments as follows on the times in which he was living : — * “ Certes in noble men’s houses it is not rare to see abundance of Arras, rich hangings of tapestrie, silver vessell, and so much other plate as may furnish sundrie cupbords to the summe often-times of a thousand or two thousand pounds at the least, whereby the value of this and the rest of their stuffe dootli grow T to be almost inestimable. Likewise in the houses of knights, gentlemen, merchantmen, and some other wealthie citizens, it is not geson to behold generallie their great provision of tapestrie, Turkie work, pewter, brasse, fine linen, and thereto costlie cupbords of plate worth five or six hundred or a thousand pounds to he deemed by estimation. But as herein all these sorts do far exceed their elders and predecessors, and in neatnesse and curiositie the merchant all other ; so in time past the costlie furniture stayed there, whereas now it is descended yet lower, even unto the inferior artificers, and manie farmers who by vertue of their old and not of their new leases have for the most part learned also to garnish their cupbords with plate, their joined beds with tapestrie and hangings, and their tables with carpets and fine naperie, whereby the wealthe of our countrie (God be praised therefore and give us grace to employ it well) dooth infinitelie appeare.” Plenty of evidence here, of the wealth of plate possessed by men of every degree late in the sixteenth century, and a little farther on he gives in more detail the amount of it that might then he found Book II. cap. 12. CHAP. X.] Sixteenth Century Plate . 187 amongst what may be called the lower middle classes. He speaks of the exchange of “ treene platters into pewter, and wooden spoones into silver or tin ; ” and after stating that in old times all sorts of “ treene ” stuff were so common that a man would hardly find four pieces of pewter, of which one was usually a salt, in a good farmer’s house, whereas there was now a fair garnish* of pewter in his cup- board, he concludes with a list of such a farmer’s plate, consisting of “ a silver salte, a bowle for wine (if not a whole neast), and a dozen of spoons to finish up the sute.” And as it was three hundred years ago, so it is now. Emerson says of the Englishman of to-day that “ he is very fond of his plate, and though he have no gallery of portraits of his ancestors, he has of their punch-bowls and porringers. Incredible amounts of plate are found in good houses, and the poorest have some spoon or saucepan, gift of a godmother, saved out of better times. ”f Smaller curiosities too have ever had a charm, for the fairer sex especially. And if our sisters carry their treasures about with them hung round their waists, their grandmothers did not value theirs the less because they kept them at home in a Chippendale cabinet. “ With what admiration of the ingenuity of the fair artist,” says Sir Walter Scott, “ have I sometimes pried into those miscellaneous groups of pseudo-bijouterie.” I “Blessings,” adds the great novelist, “ upon a fashion which has rescued from the claws of abigails and the melting-pot of the silver- smith those neglected cimelia for the benefit of antiquaries and the decoration of side-tables.” It is the plate of the century or more beginning with the reign of Henry VII. and ending with that of Queen Elizabeth, which furnishes the modern sideboard with its choicest specimens ; and rare as they are, the only wonder is that so many have been preserved, when we consider the events of subsequent times. It is needless to say that the requirements of King or Parliament in the following century swept much away ; but two less obvious causes have wrought the destruction of even more than can be laid to the charge of Cavalier and Roundhead put together. One of them has already been alluded to in detailing the measures adopted by William III. to remedy the scarcity of bullion so grievously felt at the end of the seventeenth century. The premium then offered for hall- * A garnish = a full set of an established number of pieces, such as a dozen of each sort. A “ garnish ” and “half a garnish” are both often spoken of. f Emerson’s English Traits. j St. Ronan’s Well , Chap. X. 1 88 Old English Plate. [(JHAP. X. marked silver brought to the Mint was only too tempting, and a vast quantity of ancient plate was sacrificed to the cupidity or the necessity of its owner in 1697. But scarcely less must have been melted down a century afterwards to furnish the mere metal required for the immense dinner equipages which the altered fashions of the day then rendered indispensable. No new supply of silver was available, such as that which had once poured in from Spanish America ; whence then came the tons of silver which were fashioned into dinner services with their various appendages by the industry of London silversmiths, from Lamerie to Bundell and Bridge ? It is clear that at that time another and perhaps the largest consignment of old-fashioned and disused plate must have gone to the melting-pot, to be returned to its owners in the shape of the plates, dishes, forks, and spoons with which our houses are even now to a great extent supplied. The grand service of plate which graced the royal table at the great banquet given by Sir Samuel Fludyer at the Mansion House on Lord Mayor’s Bay, 1761, which the King and Queen honoured with their presence, was made new for the occasion by Mr. Gilpin, the goldsmith, with whom the City exchanged a quantity of old plate for the new ; and many royal and other services still in use were thus provided between that time and the end of the century. Table-services of plate were pro- vided at the public expense for certain great personages of state, on taking office, such as Ambassadors, Viceroys of Ireland, and the Speakers of the House of Commons. It may be gathered from account-books preserved by the Messrs. Garrards for the interval between 1712 and 1720 that a set of the first class was about 7,000 ounces, and of the second rank about 4,000 ounces. The largest sets never included more than two or three dozen forks, one set silver, and another gilt; nor do we find mention of butter-boats, sauce-ladles, fish-knives, or butter-knives. A large cistern and fountain were usually provided, and these were probably used for washing the forks on the sideboard. These last articles often weighed 2,000 ounces or more ; but they seem to have gone out of fashion by about the year 1720. The grandest services were sometimes, but very rarely, of silver gilt, and such are popularly called “ gold services,” a mistake which suggests a remark as to the very small quantity of real gold plate that is now to be seen. Only five examples were exhibited amongst the art treasure col- lected at South Kensington in the Loan Collection of 1862 — a gold cup and cover of seventeenth century work, given by Bishop Hall to Exeter College, Oxford ; a cup on baluster stem, given to the Cor- poration of York in 1672 ; a covered cup of the following year, the CHAP. X.] Gold Plate. 189 property of Mr. J. W. Walrond; a chocolate cup and cover with one handle, found in the lake at Knowsley, belonging to the Earl of Derby; and last in date, but not least, a pair of massive ice-pails from Blenheim, weighing together no less than 365 ounces, the gift of Queen Anne to the great Duke of Marlborough. There are two gold salvers in the collection of plate of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Castle, and a small salver of pure gold was noted by Mr. Octavius Morgan amongst the plate of King William IV., which was said to have been made of the presentation rings of Serjeants-at- Law. This is no doubt still preserved. Besides these, there is a double-handled gold cup at Berkeley Castle, made by Paul Lamerie in 1717, a legacy from the then Countess of Berkeley to her celebrated daughter, Lady Betty Germain. It is of the usual plain Queen Anne pattern. A small racing cup of the same period and shape by Benjamin Pyne, a well-known goldsmith, is in existence, or was a very few years ago, engraved with a horse ridden by a jockey, and underneath the words “ Saltby Stakes.” It bore the hall-mark of the year 1710-1. Mr. Milbank, of Thorpe-Perrow, has a very similar one of 1705-6 by Harracke. The Corporation of Oxford has a solid gold porringer with two handles and cover, of the year 1680; and at Tredegar there is a gold cup presented to Sir Charles Gould, Bart., by the Equitable Assur- ance Society, about 1780. It is very possible that a good many other specimens of gold plate may exist, but enough has been said to prove its extreme rarity at the present day. Formerly it was by no means uncommon. Gold plate is frequently mentioned in the Wardrobe Accounts ; and in the Intro- duction to the State Papers of the reign of Henry VIII., printed by order of the Master of the Rolls, a banquet given by that monarch is mentioned, at which two cupboards (by which we must understand a sort of side-board of many stages), reaching from the floor to the roof, were covered with a large and varied assortment of vases all of massive gold, silver-gilt dishes of another sort being used for the service of the meats. An engraving of such a sideboard of five stages, taken from a volume published at Dilingen in 1587, descriptive of the ceremonies at Prague when the Grand Duke Ferdinand of Austria invested the Emperor and the Grand Dukes Carl and Ernest with the order of the Golden Fleece, was given by the late Mr. W. Fairholt in his description of the cele- brated Londesborougli Collection, and is reproduced here (No. 18). That eminent antiquary reminds us that the series of receding steps Old English Plate . [(’HAP. X. 190 not only served for tlie due display of the plate, but to indicate the rank of the person who used it ; persons of royal blood alone being allowed to use dressers , of five “ degres ” or stages, whilst those of four were appropriated to nobles of the highest rank, and so on down to stages of two or but a single step, which were proper for kniglits- bannerets, and unennobled persons of gentle descent respectively. The engraving is also valuable for the examples it presents of many No. 18. — SIDEBOARD OF 16TH CENTURY. quaint forms of plate then in use, and fitly introduces a few words about such obsolete articles before we go on to those that are still found and can be classed under definite heads. The tall tankard at the servitor’s feet would in those days be called a “ can,” — a German as much as an English word. The large double cups made to shut upon the rims of each other are also noticeable. These, too, are mentioned occasionally in English inventories, and are called “ double ” or “ trussing ” cups. The will of a north-country ecclesiastic, proved at York in 1895, describes his “ ciphum duplicem argenti deaurati vocatum le trussyng coppe,” and other early examples of them occur. A conspicuous object is the “ nef,” or ship, which was used in England as well as abroad ; it seems to have originally been used to contain the articles used by the noble at his banquet. The writer CHAP. X.] Gold Plate. 191 knows of no example of English workmanship or bearing an English hall-mark, hut there were a number of beautiful specimens in the Londesborough collection of foreign make. Like the “ nef,” the “just,” the “ goddard ” and the “voider” have all disappeared, hut they deserve a passing word. Of the “ justa,” de Laborde says that it was a vase or flagon for the table of an invariable size as to capacity, hut that its form varied. This agrees in general terms with the definition of the word as given by Du Cange. The “ goddard ” seems to be derived from the French goclet, a sort of goblet or cup, often with a cover. Under the head of “ mazers ” a little later, we shall find some cups of that description called “ goddards,” in an account of the year 1444. The ‘ ‘ voyder ’ ’ was a large dish in which were collected the broken victuals which were removed from the table with a large knife with a broad flat blade called the voyder-knife , from rider to empty, clear, or make void. The Bohe of Nurture, by Hugh Rhodes, the date of which is 1577, one of the curious set of handbooks of manners and etiquette repro- duced by the Early English Text Society, speaks of these vessels as follows : — “ See ye have Voyders ready for to avoid the Morsels that they doe leave on their Trenchours. Then with your Trenchour knyfe take of such fragments and put them in your Voyder and sette them downe cleane agayne.” A “ new voyder or charger ” of silver is included in a list of plate made in the course of a lawsuit in 1G1G * ; and a “ great silver voyder with a lardge ewer belonging to it,” occurs in a Tredegar inventory of 1676. Few 7 silver ones remain, hut some large brazen voiders may still he seen, or dishes which have probably been so used, but of the history or use of which nothing is known by their present owners. The student of mediaeval wills and inventories will find many other vessels mentioned here and there which it is difficult or impossible to identify with any existing forms. What is the cup called a “ costard ” in one Bristol will of 1491 ; or the article styled a “ custerd coffyn ” in another of 1580 ? A “ cliaffar ” of silver for “ partrich mynced ” is included in a list of plate of the year 1448 {Test. Ebor.). A “ little silver pot with two ears called a little conscience,” is another curious entry in the list of articles of plate in dispute upon the death of Sir H. Lee in 1616 of which mention has already been made. But as we * Masters Reports , 1616, F. to N, [ciiAr. x. 192 Old English Plate. are not primarily concerned with this kind of enquiry, it is now time to turn to articles that may be met with by the amateur and collector of the present day. SPOONS. Our notices of domestic plate must begin with spoons by right of seniority, for, says the learned de Laborde,* “ Les cuillers sont vieilles, je ne dirai pas comme le monde, mais certainement autant que la soupe ; ” after this we shall not he surprised to find that amongst the most ancient pieces of English hall-marked plate in existence are simple spoons. In early days, when forks were as yet unknown, spoons played an even more important part at meals than they do at the present day, and persons of every rank seem to have striven to possess a spoon, if only a single one, of silver. Our ancestors evidently anticipated in their way, the view of Professor Wilson — “A plated spoon is a pitifir imposition,” though, he it said, their alternative would have been honest pewter or wood ; and no bad substitute either, according to the same modern authority, who adds : — “ A wudden ladle ; indeed, gents, I’m no sure, but it’s no sae apt to be stown ; in the second, maist things taste weel out o’ wud ; thirdly, there’s nae expense in keepin ’t clean.” f It would he difficult anytime for the last six hundred years to find a man, of however humble station, without a spoon or two to bequeath to his widow or his son. The wills and inventories of the rich mention them in great numbers ; and the quaint treatises, to which reference has been made on a preceding page, contain many directions as to the service and management of the spoon at board. The Boke of Kerry ng, which was printed in 1513 by Wynkyn de Worde, perhaps from a MS. of much earlier date, instructs the panter as to setting on the salt and trenclioures, and proceeds: — “ then laye your knyves and set your brede one lofe by an other, your spones and your napkyns fayre folden besyde your brede, then cover your brede and trenchoures spones and knyves.” The Babees Book of 1475 deals with the polite use of the spoons so laid * * — ■ “ And whenne your potage to yow shall be brouhte, Take yow sponys and soupe by no way, And in youre dysshe leve nat your spone, I pray.” * Notice cles Emaux, etc., par M. de Laborde, II e Partie, 238. f Nodes Ambrosiance, XXXI. chap, x.] Maidenhead Spoons. 193 The Young Children's Book adds to this in 1500 the further advice, “ Ne pleye with spone trenchere r.e knyffe.” The spoons of the thirteenth and two following centuries seem to have had stems terminating in a plain knop, or sometimes an acorn. An entry of 1410 (Test. Ehor.) de uno cocliari plexibili, seems to point to a folding-spoon, as also do “ my foulden sylver spoone ” in another will of the same century, and unum coclear argenti falden in 1482 (Test. Ebor.). The first mention known to the author of spoons with the image of the Virgin — cum ymagi- nibus Beati Maries in fine eorun- dem — occurs in a will of 1446. These were known later as “ maidenhead ” spoons ; they are so called in a Bristol Orphan Book will of 1498, and are common enough in the sixteenth century, hut not before. The same may he said of Apostles’ spoons, which are seldom found before 1500, but were very popular for a century and a half afterwards. It was an old English custom for sponsors at christenings to present these spoons to the children for whom they answered; the wealthy giving a complete set, others a smaller number, a poor person a single spoon with the figure of No. 19. — MAIDENHEAD SPOON, CIPvCA 1540. the saint in honour of whom the child was named, or perhaps the patron saint of the donor. Hone’s Every Day Book * gives some amusing notices of this laudable custom collected from various writers, Ben Jonson, Middle- ton, and Beaumont and Fletcher, amongst the number. Ben Jonson Hone’s Every Day Book , vol. I., 176. o 194 Old English Plate. [chap x apostles’ spoons ( 1626 ). CHAP. X.] Apostles' Spoons . 195 has a character in his Bartholomew Fair, saying “ and all this for the hope of a couple of apostle-spoons, and a cup to eat caudle in.” Beaumont and Fletcher likewise in the Nolle Gentleman, say : “ I’ll be a Gossip. Bewford, I have an odd apostle-spoon.” Hone notes, too, that in 1666, the usage was on the decline, quoting from the Gossips, a poem by Shipman : — “ Formerly, when they us’d to troul, Gilt bowls of sack, they gave the bowl ; Two spoons at least ; an use ill kept ; ’Tis well if now our own be left.” A certain number of these spoons, which were called apostles’ spoons from the figures of the apostles they bore on their handles, are still to he seen, and they are of considerable value from their antiquity and comparative rarity. Good specimens have fetched high prices, varying from £5 to £10 each, and even much more of late years ; whilst a complete set of thirteen is so seldom to be met with, that a fine early set of matched spoons would doubtless realise a very large sum, perhaps not less than a thousand guineas, if put up to auction to-morrow. This opinion is borne out by the mention in the Quarterly Revieiv of April 1876, of the sale some twenty years ago, of a set of twelve such spoons belonging to a member of the Tich- borne family, for a sum closely approaching £400. Only two sets of thirteen are known to the writer : one of them is in the possession of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and consists of thirteen spoons, one of which is supposed to represent St. Paul. They are of the year 1566-7, with the exception of the St. Paul spoon, which is of the year 1515-6. The other set has been pre- sented to the Goldsmiths’ Company by Mr. George Lambert, F.S.A., and represents our Lord and twelve apostles, Matthias taking the place of Judas Iscariot. It is somewhat more modern ; but the spoons being all of one year, 1626, and by the same maker, form a set of unique interest and importance. A third set, which forms a complete series of the eleven apostles, was secured by the Rev. T. Staniforth at the Bernal sale, and is of great value from its antiquity, having been made in 1519. That gentleman also possesses the most ancient hall-marked apostle-spoon known, it being of the year 1498. The set of 1626 has been selected for our engraving (No. 20), owing to the presence of the rare “ Master ” spoon, and the fact of the whole being made by one maker at the same time. A reference to the 196 Old English Plate. [chap. X. various emblems by which the apostles are here distinguished will facilitate the identification of individual figures found in private or public collections. 1. St. James the Less, with a fuller’s bat. 2. St. Bartholomew, with a butcher’s knife. 3. St. Peter, with a key, sometimes a fish. 4. St. Jude, with a cross, a club, or a carpenter’s square. 5. St. James the Greater, with a pilgrim’s staff and a gourd, bottle or scrip, and sometimes a hat with escallop shell. 6. St. Philip, with a long staff, sometimes with a cross in the T ; in other cases a double cross, or a small cross in his hand, or a basket of fish. 7. The Saviour, or “ Master,” with an orb and cross. 8. St. John, with a cup (the cup of sorrow). 9. St. Thomas, with a spear ; sometimes he bears a builder’s rule. 10. St. Matthew, with a wallet, sometimes an axe and spear. 11. St. Matthias, with an axe or halberd. 12. St. Simon Zelotes, with a long saw. 13. St. Andrew, with a saltire cross. The figure of St. Paul distinguished by a sword, or sometimes two swords, is frequently found, St. Jude being omitted from the set of twelve to make room for him, and St. Luke and St. Mark occasionally replace St. Simon and St. Matthias. In the Byzantine Manual, James the Less, Jude and Matthias are all omitted, their places being taken by St. Paul, St. Luke and St. Mark. As to the emblems attributed to each, there is not much variation to be noted, but the saw is sometimes given to Jude as well as to Simon. This is the case in the representations of the apostolic college, by Agostino Caracci.* As it appeared advisable to give the whole of these emblems on a single page, that they might be seen at one view, an illustration is given of a group of three other apostle - spoons from a set which belonged to the late Ptev. S. Lysons (No. 21), in order that the general shape and character of such spoons, their bowls as well as handles, may be clearly understood. The most modern specimen that has come to the knowledge of the present writer is one of 1660, and belongs to Mr. Staniforth. Mr. Octavius Morgan has seen one of as late a date as 1665, bearing the figure of St. James. This bears out what was said by Shipman in 1666, as to the custom of presenting them at christenings being then - on the wane. Before turning to the ordinary domestic spoon, two special spoons must be mentioned, and first the coronation spoon preserved among Mrs. Jameson’s Legendary Art , CHAP. X.] 197 Apostles 7 Spoons . the regalia at the Tower of London. The date of this is said to be early in the thirteenth century, but, even if a reproduction of an earlier spoon, it was at all events remade, as we have seen, for the No. 21. — apostles’ spoons, 16th century. coronation of King Charles II., the goldsmith’s account for its fabri- cation having already been given at page 85. The other is the ancient spoon said to have been given by King Henry YI. together Old English Plate. [chap. X. 198 with his hoots and gloves to the loyal Sir Ralph Pudsey, at whose seat, Bolton Hail, that unfortunate monarch concealed himself for some weeks after the battle of Hexham. Of the antiquity of this spoon there is no doubt, even if its identity with the spoon which is the subject of the historical tradition is open to question. The head of its handle is octagonal, somewhat resembling the capital of a Gothic shaft, and on the flat top is engraved a single rose, the badge of the king. It is of the usual form of ancient spoons, and the marks thereon are as follows : inside the bowl is stamped the leopard’s head, — and all the ancient English spoons previous to the Restoration are so marked ; on the back of the stem is stamped with a punch a small heart for maker’s mark ; and above that is the annual letter, also stamped with a punch. This was long supposed to be the Lom- bardic letter for the year 1445-6, which would certainly agree both with the history and the make of the spoon ; but there is now much more known about marks, and strong reason to assign it to the year 1525-6, and to suspect that the story has by some chance in the course of ages transferred itself from the original spoon to this one, which is ancient enough to have an interest of its own, but is not quite old enough to have belonged to King Henry YI. These acci- dents will sometimes happen. The “ Godwin ” cup at Berkeley Castle, “ the property of Earl Godwin in 1066, and regilt by the Earl of Berkeley 1766” as the inscription tells, seems to be formed out of the head of a mace of the year 1610. The silver furniture at Knole, long thought to have been provided in honour of a visit of King James I., was the boudoir suite of a Countess of Dorset probably presented by her second husband Henry Poole, Master of the Rolls in 1680, and certainly made in that year. The form of spoons used in England seems to have continued the same from the middle of the fifteenth century to the time of the Restoration, when a new fashion was introduced which completely superseded the more ancient pattern. The more ancient model, with its baluster and seal-headed end, is shown by No. 1 (engraving No. 22). Spoons of this form, very common from 1585 to about 1620, were made as late as 1659, the date of the very latest known to the writer, whilst a specimen of the next form (No. 2) is found of the year 1667, in Mr. Octavius Morgan’s collection. The shape was then altogether changed. The stem and handle became flat and broad at the extremity, which was divided by two clefts into three points, slightly turned up, whilst the bowl was elongated into a regular ellipse, and strengthened in its construction by a tongue which ran down the back. CHAP. X.J Seal-headed Spoons . 199 This form of spoon, the handle of which is termed by French antiquaries pied de biclie or the hind’s foot, obtained till the reign of George I., when a third fashion was introduced. It is a curious cir- cumstance, that the first change in form occurred at the Restoration, 1. 2. 3. No. 22. — spoons op 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. and the second at the accession of the House of Hanover. Hid the spoons brought over with the plate of the respective courts, at these periods, set the new fashion ? In this third form (No. 8), the bowl was more elongated and elliptical, and the extremity of the handle was quite round, turned up at the end, having a high sharp ridge down the middle. It continued to he made certainly as late as 1767, hut not to the exclusion of other patterns, for towards the end of the reign of George II. another new fashion came into use, which has continued to the present time. The howl became more pointed, or egg-shaped, the end of the handle was turned down instead of up, whilst the tongue, which extended down the back of the howl, and is so well known by the name of “ the rat’s tail,” was shortened into a drop. This is the well-known plain spoon 200 Old English Plate . [chap. X. of common use from 1760 or 1765 till 1800, and is called by the trade the “old English” pattern. The fiddle-headed pattern, in which a sharp angular shoulder was introduced on either side the stem, just above the bowl and also near the end of the handle, came into vogue in the early part of the present century, and still seems popular. Tea-spoons follow the fashion of larger spoons, but are not often found before the middle years of the eighteenth century. NOTES OF ANCIENT SPOONS, ARRANGED IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 1259. xii coclearia argenti. (Will of Martin cle St. Cross.) — Surtees Society Trans. Wills and Inv.* 1296. ix coclear’ auri, j coclear’ argenti magnu pr coqua pond, xxis iijd. — Wardrobe Accounts, 24 Edw. I. 1300. 7 coclear’ auri, 8 coclear argenti signata in collo signo Parisius scilt de quodam flore glegelli. — Wardrobe Accounts, 28 Edw. I. 1366. coclearia nova ultimo facta in Ebor. — Surtees Society Trans. Test. Ebor. 1385. xxx cocliaria argenti. — Will of Hie. de Ravenser, Archdeacon of Lincoln. 1392. sex coclearia argentea cum acrinsse de auro. — Test. Ebor. 1421. xij cocliaria arg. de opere London, — Idem. 1432. calicem sanctificatam cum patena et cocliari eidem calici perti- nente. — Idem. 1440. sex cocliaria argenti de fradelett, — Idem. do. unum cocliar’ argenti cum longo brachio pro viridi zinzebro.-^ Idem. 1441. vj cocliaria argenti cum quodam signo viz hawthornleves. — Idem. 1 444. xxiiij coclear’ argenti de opt. (Will of Thos. Brygge de Salle.) — Norwich Registry. No. 23. — TEA-SPOONS, CIRCA 1760, AT BARBER-SURGEONS 5 HALL, LONDON. * Many references are made in this chap- f ter to the invaluable collection of Mortuaries, Wills, and Inventories published by the Surtees Society, under the following titles : — Testamenta Eboracensia. Wills registered ! at York. {Test. Ebor.) Wills and Inventories from the Registry of the Archdeaconry of Richmond. {Rich. Wills.) Wills and Inventories from the Registry of the Diocese of Durham. {Wills and Inv.) These volumes have also supplied some of the materials for Chapter IY. CHAP. X.] Old English Spoons. 201 1446. ij coclearia argentea et deaurata unius sectas cum ymaginibus Beatae Marias in fine eorundem. xii coclearia argentea cum glandibus in nodis. vii coclearia argentea cum nodis deauratis. do. x xx xi coclearia argenti diversorum operum et ponderis. (Inv. of Durham Priory.) — Surtees Society Trans. Yol. II. 91. 1452. sex cocliaria argenti de Parysh. — Test. Ebor. do. yj cocliaria arg. de una sorte signata cum flore vocato flour de lice. — Idem. 1459. dim. dos coclearium arg. cum akehorns. — Test. Ebor. 1463. xii coclearia argenti operis Paris’ de una secta signata cum litera — Idem. 1474. ij sylver sponnes marked wt lybbard hedys and square knoppis. — Idem. 1477. half doz. spones wt lepardes hedes prynted in the sponself. — Will of Robert Bagworth, O.P.C. 30 Wattys. 1487. ij dozen and vi sponys with dyamond poyntes pond xii unc. i qua. at 3s. 2 d., vi. li. xs. viid. ob. (Inv. of Robert Morton, gent.) — Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 30.064. 1490. vj cocliaria arg. cum fretlettez. vi coclearea arg. cum lez acornez deaur’. — Test. Ebor. 1497. sex coclearia cum capitibus puellarum. — Idem. 1498. a spone and a forke for grene ginger. (Will of Anne, Lady Scrope.) — Idem. 1500. xii coclearia argenti slipped in lez stalkes pond, inter se xiiij unc. (Will of Thos. Rotherham, Abp. of York.) — Idem. do. 12 great spoons with knobs wrought and gilt 24 oz. at 4s. 4 1. 16s. ; a dozen of spones not gilt 14 oz. at 3s. 2 cl. ; a little spone of gold. — Inv. of Thos. Kebeel S.L. 1505. xl doz. sponis, ij dos. gylt sponys. — Lord Mayor’s Feast. (E. E. Text Soc.) 1506. 6 spoons with owls at the end of the handles. See Appendix A. — C. C. C. Oxford. 1515. ij silv’ sponys being in a purse, 1 whrof being a gemewe spone and the other a spone with a forke. — Norf. Arch. Soc. Trans. 1516. 6 spoons with balls on the ends of the stems gilt. See Appendix A. — C. C. C. Oxford. 1525. spone knopped with the image of our lady. — Bury Wills. 1527. a spone of golde with a rose and pomegranat 11 oz. qt di. (Inv. of Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond.) — Camden Society Trans. 1542. a longe silver spone (and a longe forke) for sokett, a spone with an acorne doble gilt. (Will of Countess of Northumberland.) — Coll. Top. et Gen. 1546. ij sylver sponys withe angells on the knoppys gyltyd. — Wills and Inv. do. 3 silver spones with mayden heids. — Rich. Wills. 1558. xii silvr spones wt skallap shells on ther heads, one silv’ spone kilt wt an accorne on the head. — Idem. 1560. syxe silver spones of ye mayden heddes. — Idem, do. 4 silver spones with lyons off thends gilt. — Idem. 1565. spoons with diamond knops. See Appendix A. — Mercers’ Company. 1567. \ dosune lyones and ^ doss, madine hedes xvi oz., ij doss flat ended spones, xxviii oz. — Rich. Wills. do. thre spones wt knoppes of our ladie, and v wt lyons p’cell gilt. — Idem. 1570. i doss silver spones with maden heades. — Idem. 1577. vi silver spoones with lyons on the ends of them. — Idem. 1580. dosen spones, theis spones being sleppe endyd. — Wills and Inv. 1582. 3 silver spoones with acornes. — Idem. 1583. xi sylver spones with lyone knopes gilte at the ends. — Wills and Inv. do. xij spones called slippes weying xxiiij ownces and a halfe, and preised at Ys the ounce. — C. P. C. Inv. of William Dallison, Esq. 1588. xi sponnes with maden heads weing xiiij ounces and \ at 4s. per ounce, 21. 18s. — Idem. 1596. six lesser sylver spones with the knobs at th’ elides.— Rich. Wills. 202 [chap. X. Old English Plate . 1620. a sugar box spoon. (The Unton Inventories.) — Berkshire Ashmolean Soc. Trans. 1660. a dosson of sillver spouns w th flat handels. — Will of Eliz. Gresham of Titsey. Apostles’ Spoons. 1493. Apostle spoon. See Appendix A. — Bev. T. Staniforth. 1494. xij cocliaria arg. cum apostolis super eorum fines. — Test. Ebor. 1517. xiij spones with xii appostells. (Will of S r Kalph Shirley.) — Stem. Shir. 1519. eleven apostles’ spoons. See Appendix A. — Rev. T. Staniforth. 1527. xiij spones of Chryst and the xii Apostells, whereof j gilt and the rest sylver with mages gylt. — Inv. of Minster Priory in Sheppey. 1555. xii silver spones with xii apostles on heads. — Rich. Wills, do. Apostle spoon. See Appendix A. — W. R. M. Wynne, Esq., Peniarth. 1566. 12 Apostles’ spoons. See Appendix A. — 0. 0. C. Cambridge. 1567. xiiij postle spones, xxv oz. — Rich. Wills. 1570. vi silver spones with postle heads. — Idem. 1580. one dozen of postell spoones of silver weyng 24 ounces at 4s. — Idem. 1582. a dozen spones with apostles heads xxxv oz. 5 1. 16s. 8^. — Idem. 1587. my xii silver spones called the xii apostells. — Wills and Inv. 1588. xii appostell spons, the ends being gilted weing xx ounces at 4s. 8 d. per ounce. — Idem. 1626. 13 Apostles’ spoons. See Appendix A. — Presented to Goldsmiths’ Company by G. Lambert, Esq., F.S.A. For further notes of apostles’ and other spoons now in existence, see chronological list in Appendix A. MAZERS. If spoons are as old as soup, drinking vessels have been in use as long as spoons, and from spoons it is therefore convenient to pass to the ancient and interesting howls that are known as mazers. It is easier to say that these were for centuries amongst the commonest articles in domestic use, than to give a satisfactory reason for their being usually called “ murrse ” in mediaeval inventories, or to define the material of which they were made. On the former of these points a great deal of learning has been expended by the antiquaries of past generations, so much indeed that it ought to have gone farther than it has towards settling the latter. I)u Cange only ventures to say that mazers were “ pretiosiora pocula,” adding that opinions differed as to what they were made of. First he quotes Somner, a well-known writer of the early part of the seventeenth century, who supposed that they were wooden vessels and made of maple ; hut he proceeds himself to say that the better opinion is that they were the vessels called “myrrhine” in classical ages. Other authorities are then cited who in turn suggest gum, porcelain, shell, metal and lastly onyx as the materials of which they were probably fashioned. Somner was guided by the fact that the word “ maeser ” signified in the Flemish language an excrescence of the CHAP. - X. ] Mazers. 203 maple-tree ; and notwithstanding the opinion of Du Cange, which was no doubt influenced by the inventories of the twelfth and following centuries, in which he found these vessels usually described as “ de murra ” “ de murro,” or by the adjective “ murreus,” there can he no doubt that nothing hut wood was in ordinary use in mediaeval days for utensils such as these. The menders of broken cups in Paris are said by John de Gar- landia in the eleventh century to have worked upon cups made of many different kinds of wood, “ de murris, planis, brucis, de acere, et tremulo,” and he gives it as the opinion of some that the “ murra ” was a tree mentioned by Lucan — in auro murrave bibunt . In England, too, “ treen ” vessels preceded pewter, as pewter did silver plate : — “ Beech made their chests, their beds, their join’d stools ; Beech made the board, the platters and the bowls.” Cowley. A reference to the older English poets, or to early wills and the inventories which are often appended to them, will go far to convince us that mazers were merely the best sort of wooden bowls, and that these favourite drinking vessels were made of the speckled portions of the maple-tree, from which they derived their name. The word “ maser ” is explained by Skinner, an antiquary of the same century and as trustworthy as Somner, to mean a wooden cup, “ poculum ligneum, a Belg. maeser, tuber ligni aceris ex qua materia praecipue haec pocula confici solebant ; ” and to this may be added Planta’s definition of it, “ un neud ou bosse a un arbre nomme erable.” * The same vessel was called in French maclre, which, says Cotgrave, is used “ of wood whose grain is full of crooked and speckled streaks or veins.” The German Maser is a spot, speck, or the grain of wood ; Maser- liolz is veined wood in the same language, and Maserle, maple-wood or the maple-tree. From this source our word mazer is clearly derived. I11 old inventories the word is often turned into an ad- jective ; mazer eus and mazerinus are Latin, and meslyn or messilling English forms in which it is found. The latter recalls the lines of Chaucer : — “ They fet him first the swete win, And mede eke in a maselin, And real spicerie.” ffliiine of Sire Thomas, V. 13, 780. Planta. Thresor du Lang. Bas Alman. 204 Old English Plate. [chap. x. Such a meslyn or mazer is described more in detail by Spenser : — “ A mazer ywrought of the maple wood Whereon is enchased many a fair sight Of bears and tigers that make fierce war.” Shepherd's Calendar , August. That “ masere ” was a wood of price may be gathered from the old romances, French and English. Several of the French are quoted by Du Cange and De Laborde, and with these extracts may be read the lines from Syre Gaivene and the Carle :* * * § — “ The harpe was of masere fyne, The pynnys were of gold I wene.” — Y. 433. The Scottish ballad of Gil Morrice t places the silver cup and the mazer dish together on the baron’s table : — 1,1 ‘ Then up and spake the bauld baron, An angry man was hee ; He’s tain the table wi’ his foot, Sae has he wi’ his knee ; Till siller cup and mazer dish In flinders he gard flee.” It may be noted that, in the reign of Edward III., the manor of Bilsington Inferior was held by the service of presenting three “ maple ” cups at the king’s coronation. Hone records that this service was performed by Thomas Eider at the coronation of George III., when the king, on receiving the maple cups, turned to the Mayor of Oxford who stood on his right hand, and, having received from him for his tenure of that city a gold cup and cover, gave him these three cups in return. J Whilst the best and most highly prized bowls were always of maple, it is quite possible that the term “ mazer,” originally proper to those of maple -wood only, was afterwards extended to all bowls of similar form, regardless of the materials of which they were made : “ dudgeon ” wood, whatever that may be, occurs in more than one English will ; § beech has already been mentioned, and some have supposed that even if the word “ mazer ” sometimes signified maple, it was more properly applied to walnut-wood. || * These are taken from a valuable notice of mazers, and especially of the Scrope howl at York, to he found in the Transactions of the Archaeological Institute for 1846. i Percy’s Reliques , 4th ed. Yol. III. p. 94. J Hone’s Table Book, p. 616. § Unum ciphum de Begun in 1387. Bristol Orphan Book. || Parker’s Domestic Architecture, I. 144, which quotes from Nicholas Bollarde’s Version of Godefridus super Palladium, MS. Harl. 116, fo. 158, that from ripe walnuts soaked in water in a moist pit, “ ther shalle growe thereof a grett stck that we call ‘masere.’ ” CHAP. X.] Mazers . 205 Again, the half of a calabash or gourd having a hard rind was some- times employed, and Mr. Octavius Morgan suggests that the “ print ” or boss usually found in the bottom of mazer-howls had its origin in the necessity of covering with a plate of metal the point where the fibres of such gourds were clustered in a knot. This may well he so, but similar bosses are commonly found in very ancient cups of silver, as well as of wood or gourd ; so much so that an ornament in the bottom of the cup may be considered a general fashion. Gourds, and other like substances, may have been used, but wood and the turner’s art more often provided drinking- vessels for our forefathers ; and whilst the simple “ beechen goblets’’ so dear to the poets have perished, a few of the more valuable sort have been preserved to our own time. Those which have come down to us are of maple-wood, almost without exception. So much for the name and materials of these howls, which seem to have been valued in proportion to the beauty of the wood of which they were made, the knots and roots of the maple being especially prized for their veined and mottled grain. As knots would not he very thick, and therefore the howls made of them shallow, their depth was increased by mounting them with the high metal rim which is one of their characteristic features. This rim answered the further purpose of ornamenting and adding to the value of choice specimens of wood, and it was frequently of silver or silver-gilt, and bore an inscription running round it. The elaborate ornamentation found upon some of them, and parti- cularly their enamelled bosses or prints, have suggested a doubt whether they were really intended for use as drinking cups ; hut the numbers in which they are found, and their enumeration in all cases amongst other domestic utensils for the service of the table, would be conclusive evidence on this point, even if their use were not often expressly mentioned. Such a cup was, “ le hanap du Roy S. Louis dan lequel il beuvote, fait de Madre avec son couvercle de mesme matiere garny d’un pied d’ argent dore et dedans icelui hanap au milieu du fond en email de demy rond taille de fleurs-de-lys d’or a champs d’azur.” * The accounts of Stephen de la Fontaine, silversmith to the king of France in 1350, include “ un hanap de madre fin, a tout le couvercle, duquel Ten sert le Roy a table ; ” also “madres et caillers pour boire vins nouveaux,” and other similar entries. A will proved at York in 1446 disposes of no less than thirty-three Doublet, p. 344, quoted by Du Cange, 206 Ola English Plate . [CHAP. X. “ murrse usuales,” besides twelve “murrse magnse et largse,” and two of such importance as to have had names assigned to them. These must almost necessarily, judging by their description and number, have been ordinary household requisites. Others bore inscriptions which of themselves prove, if proof were needed, that they were in- No. 24.— MAZER (temp. RICH. II.). tended for wine-cups. The well-known specimen (No. 24) in the collection of the late Mr. Evelyn Philip Shirley, of Eatington, bears the legend : In tlje name of tfje ftnm'tt'e jptllc tfje fcttp aitfcr tirtnfte to me. This cup is of polished maple, and is said to be of the time of Richard II. It is figured in Parker’s Domestic Architecture of the MidAle Ages, and the annexed engraving of it was taken by permission of Mr. Parker from the same wood-block. In more than one country church a mazer now serves as an alms- disli ; but perhaps even these were originally acquired for festive pur- poses. To the description of one that was amongst the church goods at St. Saviour’s, Southwark, in 1552, it is' added “ whiche maser was geven to the wardeyns when they mete to drynk in.” * In one of the smaller mazers, belonging to the Harbledown Hospital, near Canterbury, as well as in the print or boss of a small mazer at Fairford Church, Gloucestershire, a white crystal is fixed, much resembling that found in the cover of the so-called “ Poison Tankard ” at Clare College, Cambridge. It may be that in all these cases such a crystal was selected for its supposed virtue in detecting poison. * Mr. J, R. Paniel-Tyssen’s Surrey Church Goods, temp. Edw, VI, CHAP. X.] Mazers. 207 The list, long as it is, which is appended to this section, has been carefully selected from notes of a much larger number of English mazers, with the view of indicating their antiquity, variety, value, the domestic purpose they served, and the period at which they fell out of use.* Turning meanwhile to extant specimens that we may see for our- selves what manner of vessels these ancient howls were, it is found that within certain limits they are all very much alike. They are of two kinds, large bowls holding half-a-gallon or more, usually standing on a foot, and smaller bowls about six or seven inches across, which are with or without feet as the case may he. The earliest known example belongs, like the crystal mounted mazer mentioned above, to the hospital at Harbledown, and is of the time of Edward II. It has a plain gilt foot or stem, and a plain rim or mount, whilst within it is a large silver-gilt medallion, bearing the figure of Guy, Earl of Warwick, with a curious inscription running round the edge of it. Next to this venerable relic, precedence must be given to the so- called “ Scrope ” mazer at York, which is a fine specimen of the larger sort, and, more than this, has supplied us with important evi- dence as to the course of the date-letters used in that city. It is 12 inches across by BJ inches deep. By the kindness of the Boyal Archl. Institute, in whose Transactions for the year 1846 an account of it by Mr. Robert Davies is given, we are enabled to give an engraving (No. 25) of the cup and its curious inscription. In an inventory of 1465, it is thus described : — “ Unus ciphus magnus cle murro cum ligatura plana ex argento deaurato, qui vero ciplms indulgentialis digno nomine censetnr et hac de causa : — Beatae quidem memoriae dominus Bichardus Scrop, quondam archiepiscopus Ebor., vere poeniten- tibus et confessis qui si de hoc cipho sobrie tamen cum moderamine et non excessive, nec ad voluntatem, mente pura potaverint, quadraginta dies indulgentiae contulit gratiose. Eadem enim murra appret. xls. Quam quidem murram seu ciphum Agnes Wyman, olim uxor Henrici Wyman, quondam majoris civitatis Ebor.’ fraternitati Corporis Christi obtulit quam devote, cujus anima pace requiescat perpetua. Amen.” — (From a list of jewels belonging to the Guild of Corpus Christi. Lansd. MSS., cccciii. fo. 1). Its somewhat interesting history seems to he shortly this, that presented originally to the Corpus Christi guild at York by one Agnes Wyman, who died in 141 B, and consecrated by Abp. Scrope, as sug- * An interesting catalogue of foreign instances, extending from the year 1080 down to about 1600, and taken from romances, royal accounts and other sources, is given by de Laborde, under the title “madre” in his glossary, which has been before referred to (page 192). 208 [chap. x. Old English Plate. gested by tlie inscription it bears which fixes its date as from 1898 to 1405, it passed from that guild, on its dissolution in 1546, or later, to the Company of Cordwainers, with whom it remained till, on their dissolution in turn in the present century, it passed into the hands of the then master of the company, and by him was placed in the custody of the dean and chapter of York, its present owners. It is suggested that possibly the plate on the foot, recording the names of the searchers and beadle of the company in 1622, denotes 4* a*! tetpr mpst onto a%|t iiiiistitlKtiipritafKtopift Bowt 30 in the Dasent sale, only six years afterwards. Small circular salts of 1667 are in use at Coteliele, and a set of the year 1688 are in the possession of the Innholders’ Company. These, and such as these, obtained till the reign of George II., when a small circular salt standing upon three feet came in, which gave way in its turn to the boat-shaped pattern, with pointed ends sometimes terminating in handies, so common at the end of the last century, when everything was made oval, with pointed ends, that could by any possibility at all be got into that shape. STONEWARE JUGS. There are few collectors who have not secured for their cabinets one or more of the mottled stone-ware jars, with silver cover and neck- mounts, and sometimes also silver foot-band, which were in vogue for the greater part of the sixteenth century. The jugs themselves were imported from Germany, probably from Cologne, and were mounted by the English silversmiths. The earliest notices of them occur about 1530 or 1540, and from that time to the end of the century they were common enough ; but they seem then to have gone out of fashion, for it would be difficult to find a single specimen with a seven- teenth century hall-mark. As regards ornamentation they are all very 228 Old English Plate. [CHAr. X. much alike ; tlie well-known Elizabethan interlaced fillets, with running foliage, are often engraved around the neck-bands of the earlier ones, whilst the later specimens are more often decorated with repousse work. An engraving (No. 45) is given of one of 1562, which shows Elizabethan engraving on the mount, and also some repousse work on the lid. A description of one of those exhi- bited at Kensington in 1862, will give a good idea of all of them. “ A stoneware jug of mottled brown glaze, mounted in silver gilt as a tankard, engraved neck - band of inter- laced straps ; the cover repousse with lions’ heads and fruit, sur- mounted by a flat- rayed button and small baluster, purchase formed of two acorns ; round the foot is a border of upright strawberry leaves and a gadrooned edge.” This would describe a specimen of about 1565 ; and later ones would differ from it only in the engraving of the neck-band being replaced by cartouches of lions’ heads, masks, fruit, and flowers, or the like, in repousse work. Some mounts, bearing ancient Exeter goldsmiths’ marks, have been already mentioned in an earlier chapter. (See page 89.) Jugs or “covered pots” of the same shape are found in silver sometimes, just as we shall see the cocoa-nut or the ostrich egg suggested shapes to the goldsmiths. Such a vessel is the jug of 1567 at Armourers’ Hall, and a similar one of 1571, and of English make, in the Treasury of the Patriarch at Moscow. No. i[ -STONEWARE JUG, MOUNTED IN SILVER GILT ( 1562 ), AT VINTNERS’ HALL, LONDON, CHAP. X.] Ewers , Basins , and Salvers. 229 The following notes sufficiently indicate the period during which they were found 1535. a stone pot garnished with silver and gilte with a cover of silver and gylte.— Inv. of the Maison Dieu, Dover. 1546. Lid and mount of jug, button enamelled with Parr arms ; bought at Strawberry Hill sale. — Sudeley Castle. 1551. Stoneware jug with cover engraved with musical instruments. — Messrs. Garrards. 1557. iij stone drinking potts covered with silver ij oz. ix s iiij d. 1562. Stoneware jug, cover engraved in Elizabethan fashion ; see engraving No. 45. — Vintners’ Company. 1567. Silver jug with handle and cover engraved with Elizabethan strapwork. — - Armourers’ Company. 1570. 2 ston pottes, w th covers and bands doble gilt and one pot covered with silv’, vi li xiij s iiij d. — Rich. Wills. 1571. Silver jug with handle and cover ornamented with Elizabethan engraving like that of 1567 at Armourers’ Hall. — Treasure of the Patriarch, Moscow. 1572. a stone cupp garnished with sylver and gylte. — Inv. of Thomas Lee, of Marton, co. Bucks. 1574. 1 stone pott garnished with silver pcell gilt. — Rich. Wills. 1577. twoo stone pottes layde with silver gylte. — Wills and Inv. 1578. ij stone potts bounden with silver doble gilt. — Rich. Wills. 1580. my stone pot with a cover of sylver. — Wills and Inv. do. one stone pott garnished with sylver, w th a cover and gilt. — Rich. Wills. 1583. a stone cruse with cover brun and foote of silver doble gilt. — Bristol Orphan Book. 1585. ij stone pottes with silver covers gilte and imboste. 1588. one stone jugge double gilted 1 li 10 s j one stone jugge covered with silver, 1 li 10 s. — Wills and Inv. 1596. ij stone jugges garnished with silver and double gylted. — -Wills and Inv. do. ij stone juggs. EWERS, BASINS, AND SALYERS. These occur in every old will and inventory of any importance, and being articles in daily use at every table, must have been very common indeed, making up as they did for the want of any such utensil as the modern fork. We must remember that sometimes more than one person ate off the same dish, and that with the fingers, aided only with a knife or spoon as the case required ; and even if a rule prescribed in the Boke of Nurture were never transgressed, — “ Sett never on fysche nor flesche beest nor fowle trewly More than ij fyngurs and a thombe for that is curtesie,” still we shall agree with de Laborde in his remark on ancient basins, “ que l’absence de fourchette et l’habitude de manger a deux dans la meme ecuelle et a plusieurs dans le meme plat, rendaient necessaire la proprete des mains, pour les autres avant le diner, pour soi-meme apres.” 2 3 0 [CHAI\ x. Old Eiig-lisk Plate. * <-> Ewers and basins were accordingly banded before and after every meal, and after every course, the hands being held over the basin whilst water, hot, cold, or scented, was poured over them from the ewer by the server. In the houses of the great they were of costly material, and fine naperie for use with them is found in abundance amongst the household goods of the middle ages. The Boke of Kervyng and the Babees Boke do not omit to regulate the serving of the ewer and basin. The Boke of Kervyng directs the attendant to see before meat that “ thyn ewery be arayed with basyns and ewers and water hote and colde, and se ye have napkyns ...” and the manner in which they should be used at the end of the meal is laid down in the Babees Boke : — 11 Thanne somme of yow for water owe to goo Somme holde the clothe, somme poure uppon his hande.” The little manual entitled Ffor to serve a Lord directs this service before and after meat in 1500, and even in 1577 the Boke of Nurture mentions “ a basen ewer and towell to No. 46. — ewer (1545), at corpus christi college, camb. aray your cupbord.” With the appear- ance of forks the use of the basin was to a great extent discontinued, and most of the basins themselves have disappeared, perhaps to be converted into forks. It may well be that some of the forks now in use were made out of the ewers and basins which their invention rendered superfluous. The few now remaining are used for sideboard decoration, or for handing rose-water after dinner, and the most ancient of them are only of the middle of the sixteenth century. Amongst the earliest specimens are the silver-gilt ewer and salver engraved with foliated arabesques, which were the gift of Archbishop Parker to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, in 1570. They bear CHAP. X.] Elvers , Basins , and Salvers . 231 the hall-mark of 1545. Of these the engravings (Nos. 46 & 47) give a good idea, showing the arabesques which were the usual decoration of the Henry VIII. period. Next to these rank a silver-gilt ewer and salver of 1579 and 1581 respectively, lent by the Duke of Butland, the former formed of agate rings with silver-gilt bands between them, ornamented, as well as the top and bottom of the vase, in repousse, with dolphins and tritons in cartouches, snails, shells, fruit, flowers, birds, lobsters, tortoises and many other objects, “ the mounts con- JN T o. 47. — SALVER (1545), AT corpus christi college, camb. nected by four projecting female terminal figures, with figures on their heads ending in scrolls ; the handle is formed by the head and body of a warrior, and terminates in twisted serpents’ tails. On the back of the warrior is a large snail, with a smaller snail on the top of its shell, under the lip a female mask. The circular piece is repousse, with lions’ claw r s, masks, and fruit between, with a boss of four pro- jecting eagles’ heads.” The salver is 18 inches in diameter, and has eight oval pieces of agate inserted on the border, and a circular piece in the raised boss, the whole field being filled with repousse scrolls and arabesques of birds, etc., the centre ornaments being a shrimp, lobster, dolphin and tortoise. The Corporations of Bristol and Norwich possess fine sets, — that at Bristol bearing the date-letter for 1595, and the other the marks for 232 Old English Plate. [chap. X. 1617. Both are ornamented with engraving and repousse work, being admirable examples of the English goldsmith’s art. These also were exhibited at South Kensington in 1862, and are described in No. 48.— EWER (1617), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF NORWICH. detail in the official catalogue. The Norwich examples are given in engravings (Nos. 48 and 49). In the early part of the seventeenth century they were ornamented with beautiful repousse strap-work, interlaced and enclosing boldly treated flowers or marine monsters, and have raised bosses, or “ prints,” in the centre of the basin, sometimes enamelled, but oftener engraved, with coats of arms or other devices. CHAP. X.] Ewers , Basins , and Salvers . 2 -5 >5 33 The engraving (No. 50) is of a rose-water dish belonging to the Merchant Taylors’ Company, one of two such dishes exhibited by them in the Loan Collection of 1862 at South Kensington. It is described in the catalogue as “a circular rose-water dish, silver, parcel gilt. On a boss in the centre, much raised up, is a coat of arms, viz. : a fess between eight billets. Round the boss are six No. 49. — SALVER (1617), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF NORWICH. panels, containing dolphins and flowers, all in repousse. Dolphins and flowers in panels are also repeated in the rim. The other part of the dish is engraved with flowers in scrolls.” It may he added that the arms are those of Maye ; one Richard Maye was Warden of the Company in 1575, and Master some few years later. Such examples are found down to the end of the reign of Charles I., after which a plainer fashion prevails, the salver being quite unorna- mented, and the ewers somewhat rude cup -shaped jugs, with or without feet, and with a plain handle. With the accession of James II. come in the well-known helmet-shaped patterns which afterwards 234 Old English Plate . [chap. X. became very usual, and lasted till about 1720. Tlie later ones were sometimes of elaborate design and finish ; and, by permission of the Goldsmiths’ Company, an engraving is given of the finest known specimen hy that celebrated smith, Paul Lamerie (No. 51). This, too, was exhibited in 1862, and was described as follows : — No. 50.— ROSE-WATER SALYER (1617), AT MERCHANT TAYLORS’ HALL, LONDON. “ On the lower part of the vase is a winged mermaid with two tails, accompanied by two boy- tritons blowing conches. The foot consists of marine flowers, shells, and reptiles. On the upper part of the vase are festoons of flowers and the Company’s badges, the leopards’ heads. The handle has a very bold half-length figure of a sea-god, terminat- ing in foliage.” It is of the year 1741. The salver is 888 ounces in w T eight, and of workmanship corre- sponding with that of the ewer, the border being designed boldly in Louis Quatorze scrolls, and panels enclosing figures of boys repre- senting heathen gods. It is not, however, very effective. CHAP. X.] Ezvers , Basins , and Salvers. 235 The salvers of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth centuries were plain circular dishes, and repousse work gave way to plain engraving towards the middle of the former century. Those which accompany the helmet-shaped ewers are usually quite plain. No. 51.— EWER (1741), BY PAUL LAMERIE, AT GOLDSMITHS’ HALL, LONDON. In the reign of Queen Anne, chasing is found, the edges of the salvers being both chased and shaped, the salvers themselves standing on three, or sometimes four, small feet. Some are both engraved and chased ; the talents of Hogarth were for some six years employed in engraving plate for Mr. Ellis Gamble, the silversmith, to whom he was apprenticed in 1712 ; and salvers or waiters, decorated by him, are said still to be seen. Strangely enough, the mark of his master is not to be found amongst those registered at Goldsmiths’ Hall at [CHAP. X. 236 Old English Plate . that period. The plainer salvers of this date have often a gadrooned edge. This style of ornament was succeeded by the headed edges of the time of George III., and circular or shaped salvers were replaced by the plain oval trays, having handles at the ends, which are then found almost to the exclusion of any other patterns. The following list gives a selection of examples, of all dates from the earliest : — 1284. par pelvium arg’ emp Loud. — Account of “jocalia” purchased for the king’s use and presents, 12 & 13 Edw. I. 1296, 1 par pelvium ; 1 lavator’ arg’ p aula, 1 bacinus arg’ p eodem. — Wardrobe Accounts, 24 Edw. I. 1324. un ewer a triper dorre aymall t~ taille d’une vyne. — Indenture of royal plate, 17 Edw. II. 1339. un eawer endorre od doubles ymages (aymals) en* f ounce t~ en pomel chisellez d’une vigne. — Indenture of “jocalia” found in the Treasury, 12 Edw. III. 1347. ij bacyns, ma hure d'argent dore, un petit ewer d’argent dorre (will of John, Earl of Warren). — Test. Ebor. 1349. duos baciones enaymaillatos in fundo quorum in uno est judicium Salamonis et in alio est rota fortunae, duo magna lavatoria (will of Henry, Lord de Percy). — Idem. 1369. un peire des bacyns ove swages endorres et enammaylles ; ewers ove spoutes. — Vessels bought of the executors of John Hiltoft, goldsmith, 42 Edw. III. 1392. Eichard, Earl of Arundel, leaves to his wife Philippa a pair of basons, “ in which I was accustomed to wash before dinner and supper.” — Nichols’ Test. Vet. 1400. unum perepelvm de argento cum coopert’ cum armis meis et Domini de Nevylle in fundo ; cum ij pelvis et ij aquariis argenti cum armis meis in fundo (will of Eichard de Scrop.) — Test. Ebor. 1419. duos pelves argenteos cum rosis in medio deauratis, dues aquarios cum ij idriis argenteis (will of Will. Gascoigne, L. C. J.) — Idem. 1433. unum ewer argenti cum le spowte in certis partibus deauratum. — Idem. 1444. j layer cum ij spowtes deaurat’. — Idem. 1463. iij pelves cum pryntis et boses argenti et enameld in medio eorundum. — Idem. 1500. two basons and two ewers part gilt weighing 117 oz. at 3 s. 4 d. per oz. ; two great basons with two ewers partly gilt 183 oz. at 3s. 4 cl. — Will of Thomas Kebeel, S.L. 1503. an ewer and basin of silver the swages gilt. 1505. a payyer of gilt basons, xviij basins with ewers. — Inv. of Lord Mayor’s Feast. (E.E. Text Society.) 1519. duos pelves argenti cu lavat’s in medio unius est una Eosa in alio scutu armor’ meor’ (will of Eawf Lathom citizen and goldsmith). — C.P.C. 32 Ayloffe. For existing specimens see Appendix A. : — 1545 , 1590 , 1595 , 1616 , 1617 , 1640 , 1651 , 1668 , 1670 , 1675 , 1676 , 1677 , 1679 , 1680 , 1685 , 1705 , 1706 , 1715 , 1720 , 1721 . These images were slipped trefoils, the alternate ones being turned upside down. CHAP. X.] Standing Cups and Hanat>s . 237 STANDING CUPS AND HANAPS. An article of hardly less importance in mediaeval times than the great salt-cellar, was the standing cup in which lord, abbot, or gentle- man received his wine from the butler’s hand after it had been duly “ essayed.” Whilst simple “ treen ” cups were used by the lower classes, those which graced the table of the high-born and wealthy were always of great magnificence and of costly material. The splendour of the cup marked the consequence of him who used it, as the standing salt did the position of the lord of the feast ; and if not of gold, silver, or silver- gilt, it was formed of some then rare material, such as the egg of the ostrich, the shell of the cocoa-nut, or, at least, of curiously mottled wood mounted on a foot and surrounded with bands of precious metal. Such cups were of great value, and some were prized no less for the historical or other associations which surrounded them than for their intrinsic worth. They were often known, not only in the household of the owner, but even in the district in which he lived, by special names, and the custody of the cup has signified the ownership of an estate. The “ Constable Cup ” of Sir Richard de Scrop in 1400, and the great silver cup with a cover called “ Le Chartre of Morpeth,” men- tioned in the will of John, Lord of Greystock, in 1486, must have been of some such importance as this.* Richard, Earl of Arundel, in 1892 bequeaths to his wife Philippa “her own cup called Bealchier.”! This was no doubt a family possession of much interest ; and in many other less notable cases, drinking-cups are found to bear particular names, sometimes being called after saints. Mazers named “ Spang,” “ Cossyn,” and “ Crumpuldud,” have already been mentioned, all of the fifteenth century ; and a still earlier one called “ Godezere ” was bequeathed by a burgess of Bristol to the chapel of St. Thomas there in 1891.1 These few instances will be enough to show that favourite drinking-cups were often given pet or special names ; but the list might be prolonged indefinitely. The same Bishop of Durham whose Indian nut will be presently mentioned, calls one of his cups “ Chante- plure ” in 1259 ; § whilst Edmund de Mortimer, Earl of March, has a cup of gold with an acorn called “ Benesonne ” and another of silver called “ Wassail,” at his death in 1880. || John Halle, rector of Bus- cot, leaves to his friend and neighbour the vicar of Leclilade, a cup * Surtees Society. — Test. Ebor. t Nichols. — Test. Vet. £ Bristol Orphan Boole, Will No. 45. § Test Ebor. || Test. Vet. Old English Plate . [chap. X. 2^8 called “ Cobbard ” in 1400. The prior of Durham called one of the cups of his house “ Beda ” in 1446.* A few words must be said both as to the term “ lianap,” so often applied to cups of this description, and as to the mode of using them, before going into further detail as to their varying fashion. The Norman-French word “ lianap,” then, which has at last come to mean a basket for package, in fact a hamper, is derived from the Saxon hncep, a cup or goblet, and was applied in mediaeval days to standing cups with covers, but only as it would seem to cups of some size and import- ance. As drinking vessels grew up, with the increasing luxury of the times, from wooden bowls into the tall “ standing cups and covers ” which is the proper description of the cups called hanaps, the use of the latter term became confined to such cups alone, and the place where such hanaps were kept was termed the lianap erium. This was necessarily a place of safe keeping and therefore a sort of Treasury. The hanaper accordingly was the safe place in the Chan- cery where the fees due for the sealing of patents and charters were deposited, and being received by the Clerk of the Hanaper (or clerk of the Chancery Treasury), the term hanaper office has continued to the present time. The hanaperium may originally have been a strong chest, and so the terms hanaper or hamper may have been applied and continued, at last exclusively, to a chest-like basket with a lid, used for various purposes. A very few notes will show the importance of the hanap. A statute of 1285, t speaking of the security for good conduct to be given by tavern-keepers, prescribes that an offender should be bound over by “ soen lianap de la taverne ou par altre bon gaged This was evidently his principal drinking vessel. Again, William Lord Latimer specially mentions “ la grant hanaper d’ argent endoere appelle Seint George ” in his will dated 1381, and John of Gaunt in 1394 bequeaths “ moun phis grant hanap d’ord In both these cases the cup is one of price. Far later on, in 1670, it is found that “ he which is mayor of London for the time shall have an hanap d’or or golden tanker at the corona- tion of every king.”! Sometimes these grand cups were placed upon the table and at others were handed to the lord when he chose to drink. The Boke of Nurture , by Hugh Pdiodes, written in 1577, directs the server as follows : — When he (the master) listetli to drinke and taketh of the * Surtees Society, Vol. II. + 13 Edw. I., stat. 5. Statuta Civitatis London’. J Caltlirop’s Reports, 1670, cited in Wright’s Diet, of Obsolete and Provincial English . chap, x.] Hanaps . 239 cover, take tlie cover in thy hand and set it on agayne ; ” and the Boke of Curtasye , circa 1430, another of these treatises, shall de- scribe in its own words the mode of serving wine at that still earlier period : “ The kerver anon withouten thought Unkovers the cup that he hase brought Into the coverture wyn he powres out Or into a spare pece * withouten doute Assayes an gefes tho lorde to drynke O'r settes hit down as hym goode thynk . . A It further proceeds to say : “ Bothe wyne and ale he tase indede Tho butler says withouten drcde No mete for mon schalle sayed be Bot for kynge or prince or duke so fre . . This obliges us to note the constant fear of poison in which our ancestors lived, and their curious belief in the power of certain sub- stances to detect its presence. It has already been remarked that cups and salt-cellars in many cases had covers to prevent the intro- duction of poison ; hut besides this, all meats and drinks were tasted or assayed by him who served them before they were partaken of by the lord, the books of etiquette prescribing the extent to which these precautions should be carried in serving at the tables of personages of various ranks. The most exalted had both meat and drink tested, those of lower station only their beverages. “ Cups of Assay ” are not unfrequently found in the inventories of the great ; they are usually of small size. Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, in 1527 had no less than four, graven with various devices in the bottom, such as a rose, a ring, or an eagle, and weighing from six to nine ounces each. Katherine Countess of Northumberland, in 1542, has “ a cope of assey gilt with cresande sett on the bodome,” and half a century later, in 1614, Henry Howard, Earl of Northamp- ton, has such a cup nine ounces in weight. The cover, or a “ spare pece ” according to our rhyming authority, was used instead of a special cup by people of less consequence. A further precaution was sometimes adopted in making the cup itself of one or other of the substances alluded to above. Salts, as we have seen, and cups, as we shall also find, were formed of the horn of the narwhal, which did duty for that of the fabulous beast known as the * Pece, cuppe ; Pecia, crater. “A pece of silver or of metalle, a pyece of wyne cuppe ” = crater. A cuppe, tasse, lianap. — Prompt. Parv. It is of constant occurrence in old inventories. 240 [chap. x. Old English Plate. unicorn, and was firmly believed to have the power of detecting poison.* Turquoises were supposed to turn of a paler blue, and certain crystals to become clouded, in the presence of poisons, and both were used in this faith for the decoration of cups. The well-known “ Poison cup ” at Clare Coll., Cambridge, has such a crystal mounted in the centre of the lid. Turning now to standing cups as we find them, precedence must be given to those made of ostrich eggs and cocoa-nuts, mounted in silver, and having feet of the same metal. These were very popular in early times, and they are classed together because they are of similar size and shape, and their mounting is of the same character. Sometimes the cup itself was formed of silver or silver-gilt, shaped as an egg or nut, and in these cases it is difficult to say which of the two it is intended to represent. It has been suggested that the silver examples only occur when the earlier nut or egg has been broken, and the owner not being able to procure another has refilled the mount with a silver bowl or lining of similar shape ; but to set against this, it may be said that some of the silver linings are found of the same date and fashion as the feet and other mountings with which they are fitted. A notice of some of these cups will serve to show for how many centuries they held their ground. As early as 1259, a bishop of Durham bequeaths his “ cyphum de nuce Indye cum pede et apparatu argenti ; ” and at the opposite end of the social scale, the inventory of a felon’s goods in 1887 comprises amongst other things “one cup called a note with foot and cover of silver value 30s.” f An indenture of the following year mentions “ a nut on a foot and silver covercle ” amongst jewels sold. In 1349 Henry Lord Percy dies possessed of “ unam copam de uno gripe and a Treasury Inventory of 1399 (1 Henry VI.) contains the following item : “ j maser tour de nutte garnisez d’argent enorrez t cov’erc.” Perhaps a cup of silver “ called the rocke,” in the will of a Bristol merchant of 1569, was one formed of what was supposed by its owner to be a roc’s egg. In the two next centuries they are often mentioned, as the following * Mr. F. W. Fairholt, in his Descriptive Catalogue of the Londesborough Collection , speaking of a nef mentioned in the inventory of Charles V. of France, which is said to hold “his essay, his spoon, knife, and fork,” alludes to essaying by the narwhal horn as follows: — “The essay was a piece of horn believed to be that of the unicorn, but really obtained from the narwhal ; and which was supposed to be an antidote to poison, and to detect its presence by becoming agitated when plunged in liquor containing it ; for which reason it was attached to a chain of gold for the greater convenience of dipping it in the cup, and it was the butler’s duty to make trial or essay of the wine when pre- senting it to his lord.” t Filey’s Memorials of London and Lon- don Life, pp. 199, 203. % Surtees Society Trans. — Test. Ebor. Gripe or grypey — egg of the grype or griffin. CHAP. X.] Cocoa-Nut Cups , 241 list, compiled from tlie volumes of the Surtees Society and other sources, may serve to show : 1419. 1420. 1428. 1429. 1431. 1433. 1444. 1454. 1459. 1476. 1481. 1490. 1492. 1508. 1527. alius ciphus vocatus a grypey ligatus cum argento et deaura to.— Will of Judge Gascoigne.- — Test. Ebor. unum note argenti herneisiatum et deauratum optimum cum coopertorio unum ciplium vocatum Note cum cooperculo deaurato. — Will of John Fromond, Archl. Jour. XVI., 166. j hanape dargent dorrez fait a la m de j notte poissant de troye iij lb. iiij unz q at le lb. xlviij.?., viij li. — Treasury of the Exchequer, Inv. 6 Henry VI. a coupe made of gripes eye garnysshed wt siluer and ouer gilt with a fote and a couercle. — Will of Sir Gerard de Bray broke of Danbury, Knt. unum nigrum nott coopertum et deauratum cum una aquila in summitate cooperculi ; unum chalescopp argenti et deaurati ad modum unius gripe egg cum scriptura in cooperculo. — Test. Ebor. unum ciphum vocatum le nutt coopertum cum pede argenti stantem. — Idem, iij Gripes eyes cov’ed garnys- shed wt silver and gilt weyng vi lb. unc p’s the unce ij-s. vi<7. Sma i xli. xii s. vi d. ; also ij notes cov’ed garnysshed wt silver f* gilt weyng xxiii unces p’s the unce ij.?. Yid. Sma lviis. vid. — Treasury of the Exchequer, Inv. 22 Henry VI. unam peciam vocatam Grypeg deaur’. — Test. Ebor. meum optimum nutt, meum less nutt. — Idem, j standyng blake nutte quae fuit matris meae. — Idem, a standyng gilt nutt. — Will of Sir Thos. Lyttelton. Nichols’ Test. Vet. a cup of silver called the grype’s egg.— Test. Ebor. unum ciphum vocatum le nutte stantem argen’ in toto cum coopertorio. — » Idem. a notte paynted the coveryng silver and gilt— Idem. a gylt nut with fote bryme and rybbes of sylver and gilt ; a small nut with fote brime and cover of sylver.— Inv. of Minster Priory in Sheppey. No. 52.- COCOA-NUT CUP (CIRCA 1500), AT IRON- MONGERS’ HALL, LONDON. 242 Old English Plate. [CHAP. X. 1535. a littell olde nut with a bonde of sylver and gilt and a littell bonde of sylver and gilt ; ij nutts with ij covers of sylver and gylt, and the said nuts garnysshed with silver and gilt, xxxiii uns. — Inv. of Maison-Dieu, Dover ; 26 Henry VIII. a nutt gilt with a cover. — Surtees Society. Wills and Inv. one nutt double gilt weinge xxxv. ounces xi li. xiiis. iiij^. — Idem. a nutt enclosed with silver and gilte of accorne woorcke and a cover gilte for the same. — Bristol Orphan Book. my black nut with the cover. — Wills and Inv. one nutte of silver to drink in dwoble gilte with a cover. — Wills and Inv. 1558. 1570. 1572. 1577. 1596. These notes plainly indicate that just as a silver-gilt howl shaped as a mazer would sometimes be called by that name, silver cups were called nuts or eggs if they were so formed. Cups of all three materials are extant. Cocoa - nut cups of the fifteenth century are to be seen at Oriel and New Colleges, Oxford, the latter society owning two specimens. The great City Companies possess several ; the Yintners, the Ar- mourers, and the Ironmongers each have one, from the latter of which our engraving (No. 52) is taken. It gives a very good idea of the way in which they were gene- rally mounted at the beginning of the sixteenth century. The example at Vint- ners’ Hall is very like this, and bears the hall-mark of 1518. Ostrich -egg cups are not so common, perhaps because they were rather more easily broken. Exeter College, Oxford, possesses an egg-cup of the first years of the seventeenth cen- tury (No. 58), and the Earl Howe another of earlier date ; all these were exhibited in the Loan Collection at South Kensing- ton in 1862. There is a very ancient ostrich egg at Corpus Cliristi College, Cambridge, the history of which can be traced to the four- teenth century. It was originally used for carrying about the Host, and being broken in the mastership of one Moptyd, or between No. 53. — OSTRICH- EGG CUP (1610), AT EXETER COLLEGE, OXFORD. CHAP. X.] Ostrich- Egg 1553 and 1557, it is said to have been renewed at the ex- pense of Richard Fletcher, when Bishop of Bristol (1589 - 92). This account of it, given by Masters in his history of the college, written late in the last century, is borne out by the hall-mark which is still legible on the mount, and fixes its date as of the year 1592. The cup, now much broken, is held together by its very plain silver tripod mounting, the only orna- ment of which is a little Eliza- bethan engraving. The Exeter College cup is of 1610, and has a characteristic foot of that period with a stem formed as ostriches’ legs ; the cover is surmounted by an ostrich standing on a plume of ostrich - feathers (No. 53). A third, somewhat more mo- dern but an excellent and typical specimen nevertheless, is the beautiful cup in the collection of Mr. Henry Willett (No. 54). Its history is told by an in- scription running round the top of the cup and on the flag borne by the figure surmounting the cover. The date of its presenta- tion as engraved on the cup ac- cords with the hall-mark, which gives the year 1623. The Earl of Ducie has a silver- gilt cup of ostricli-egg or cocoa- nut shape, mounted with vertical hinged bands to hold the bowl, which rests in a socket or frame supported by four dolphins placed Pw 2 |^|^SerS7l 2 43 s:4£S No. 54. — OSTRICH-EGG CUP (1623), PROPERTY OF IT. WILLETT, ESQ. 244 Old English Plate . [chap. X. on the top of a circular foot. This specimen, which is possibly unique, is of the year 1584. Other drinking lianaps, no less ancient than the last, are formed of horns mounted in silver, as shown in the accompanying engraving No. 55. — wassail horn (14th cent.), at queen’s college, oxford. (No. 55), of the Queen’s College horn, now used as a loving cup. It is traditionally called poculum caritatis, or loving cup, and is said to have been presented to the college by Philippa, queen of Edward III., its founder in 1340 being her chaplain, Robert de Eglesfield. According to the statutes the members of the college were to be summoned together by the sound of horn ; possibly this was the horn originally used for the purpose. It is formed of a buffalo-liorn, and is 19J inches high, the horn itself being no less than 25 inches long. The cover with its eagle is of later work than the hands of the horn. CHAP. X] Drinking Horns . 245 A similar horn (No. 56) is in the possession of Christ’s Hospital, London. Either because horns as well as the other substances previously mentioned were supposed to have the property of revealing the presence of poison in any liquor poured into them, or for some better reason, they have been used as drinking vessels from early times. A drinking horn originally represented estates held by Cornage or by the horn ; one of the most ancient being the Pusey No. 56. — MOUNTED DRINKING HORN AT CHRIST’S HOSPITAL, LONDON. horn,* by which the family of the same name hold the village of Pusey in Berkshire. The gift of King Canute, it has gone with the estate from time out of mind, and has been the subject of a Chancery suit in which it was held that the heirs were entitled to it if the land was held by cornage. (Pusey v. Pusey, 1 Vernon, 272.) The same great ecclesiastic who died possessed of a nut in 1259, also had a drinking horn, which he left to his sister Agatha, describing it as “ cornu meum magnum ad bibendum cum apparatu argenti.” Sir Brian de Stapleton in 1894 had “ j corne esteaunt sur deux pees,” which must have been very like our engraving ; whilst Chief Justice Gascoigne leaves a cup called “ Unicorn ” to his son in 1419. Three quarters of a century later Sir Brian Rowcliffe mentions in his will “ unum cornu Archaoloyia, iii, 3. Archceoloyia, xii. 377* 246 Old English Plate. [chap. x. ad bibendum garnesiatum cum argento et deaur’.”* A fifth example may be given from the inventory of the Guild of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Boston taken in 1584. “ Itm a drynkynge home ornate with silv’ and gilte in three p’tes of it wt ij feit of silv’ and gilte w 7 t a stone sett in silv’ an gilte weyng in the whole xiiij unc. di.” This is the same date or thereabouts as the horn engraved above. Of a little earlier period is the celebrated Cawdor horn long preserved at Golden Grove. An engraving of this (No. 57) has been kindly placed at the author’s disposal by His Grace the Duke of Beaufort. It has a foot of silver, ornamented with the royal supporters, the date of which is somewhere about 1485, and it is said to have been the first drinking vessel used by Henry, Earl of Richmond, after landing in England in that year, and presented by him to David up Evan, son of Roderick the Great, who lived at Llwyndafydd in Llandisiliogogo, and there entertained the Earl and his men in his expedi- tion against Richard III. An elephant’s tusk, carved with figures and mounted with silver of sixteenth-century work, is to be seen at the British Museum. Lastly, we come to standing cups made entirely of the precious metals themselves. These are not confined to any one century, and there are extant specimens to illustrate the w T ork of successive gene- rations of goldsmiths for three hundred years. In speaking of the word hanap it appeared that such cups as these w T ere in fashion as far back as records go. The earliest specimen, however, bearing a recognised English hall-mark, and therefore of an ascertained date, is no older than 1481 ; not but that there are a few still more ancient cups in existence. The enamelled cup at Lynn, for instance, is of the fourteenth century, a covered cup of beaker shape at Oriel College, Oxford, and one or two others at Cambridge are of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, but of none of them can it positively be said that No. 57. — THE CAWDOR HORN (TEMP. HENRY VII.). * All these are from the often-quoted Teetamenta Eboracensia ; the wills cited were proved 1259, 1394, 1419, and 1494 respectively. CHAP. X.J Standing Clips. 2 47 tliey are of English make. Some notice must nevertheless be taken of them in passing. The Lynn cup is one of the most interesting cups in existence ; it has been known as “ King John’s cup ” for centuries, and is said to have been given to the town by that king. This can hardly be the case, as the costumes of the enamelled figures with which the bowl is covered are of the four- teenth century ; but it is of no less interest for this, being still the most re- markable specimen of the goldsmith’s w T ork of the period, ancient enough, to which it really belongs. It has been suggested that the King John was John of France, who may have visited King’s Lynn with Edward III. and Queen Philippa on one of their progresses, and this is a suggestion which accords well with the workmanship of the cup. It is of silver gilt, 15 inches high, with a cover, and enriched, as we have said, with enamels, the bowl being divided into compartments by vertical ribs, in which figures ap- pear, male and female. The stem is very slender, and rises from a circular foot. It was exhibited at South Kensington in 1862, and had before that been en- graved in Examples oj Art Workmanship. The curious cup at Christ’s College, called the Foundress’ cup, is of fifteenth- century work (No. 58). Its diagonal bands, ornamented with running foliage in repousse, and the Gothic cresting which surrounds the cover and the base, might be of the second half of that century, or even a little later, but the arms No. 58. — the foundress’ cup (circa 1440), AT Christ’s college, Cambridge. 248 [CHAr. X, Old English Plate . enamelled on the boss within the cup are those of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, impaled with Cobliam of Sterborough, and this impale- ment, being the distinctive coat of Duke Humphrey’s second wife CHAP. X.] Standing Cups. 249 Eleanor Cobh am according to the heraldry of that day, would point to 1440, or a year or two earlier, as the true date of the cup. The arms long passed for those of Countess Margaret ; and the cup itself is supposed to have come into the possession of the College at her death in 1509, along with a beaker or stoup and her salt-cellars. The beaker, or stoup at Oriel Coll., Oxford, of which an engraving* (No. 59) is given, is another very ancient cup, but, like the last, not ot the date that tradition would assign to it. The letters and Lancastrian badges seem to refer to Prince Edward, son of Henry "VT. ; but at any rate the cup is nearly a century and a half later than the reign of Edward II., whose College it gift to the was formerly supposed to be. It much resembles the stoup given to Christ’s College, Cam- bridge, by its foundress Margaret, Countess of Richmond. This at Oriel College is probably of Paris make and of the year 1462, whilst the Cam- bridge one is certainly English and only a little later in date — 1507 (No. 60). The daisy, the Tudor rose, and the port- cullis forming the letter M, are all emblematic of the Countess’ name and family, just as the orna- mentation of the Oriel beaker indicates the Lan- castrian prince, who no doubt once owned it. The “ Leigh” cup of the Mercers’ Company (No. 61) is the second earliest of the hanaps known to be hall-marked. It is of the year * For this engraving, as for that of the Oriel College mazer, and others, the author is indebted to the Council of the Eoyal Archaeological Institute. No. 61. — THE LEIGH CUP (1499) AT MEKCERS’ HALL, LONDON. CHAP. X.] Standing Cups . 251 1499, and notwithstand- ing some small alteration and repair, is a beantifnl specimen of goldsmiths’ work. It is silver gilt, sixteen inches high and six and a half inches in diameter. The pierced hand of Gothic tracery with a cresting of Tudor flowers is repeated around the cover, and in the lozenge - shaped panels, into which the bowl of the cup is divided by the intersection of corded hands, are maidens’ busts and flagons alternately, the former much like the busts on the sides of the Mercers’ Company beak- ers, an engraving of which will be given later. A demi- virgin gules within an orle of clouds, forms the coat-of-arms borne by this Worshipful Com- pany ; and this is further alluded to by the figure of a pure virgin with a unicorn reposing in her lap, which surmounts the cover of the cup. The coats- of- arms around the knop, and the lettered bands, are in enamel. The cup next to be noticed is of the same or possibly even of a little earlier date than the last. It is the beautiful “Richmond ” cup of the Armourers’ Company, so called because presented in 1557 by one John Richmond (No. 62). It 52 Old English Plate. [chap. X. is thirteen inches high, and weighs fifty- one ounces. Its style speaks for itself, and recalls the simple but elegant make of the hour-glass salts of about the same date. The bowl is not unlike that of the Leigh cup m shape, though the real outline of the latter is somewhat hidden by the ornaments ; they both resemble in this respect a chalice of 1511 at Chewton Mendip, and the Anathema cup, at Pembroke College, Cambridge, which is of the year 1481. We now come to a typical specimen of Elizabethan art in the tall cup (No. 68), given by Archbishop Parker to Corpus College, Cambridge. Not the less English because it reminds us of the fine Dutch and German hanaps of the same period, it is one of the finest of its class. Dutch and English ornaments were wonderfully alike at this time. As characteristic is the “ Chapman ” cup of the Armourers’ Company (No. 64). The gift of one Edmond Chapman in 1581, its hall-mark corresponds with its history, whilst the egg-and-tongue moulding and the bands of engraven foliage identify the cup at a glance as of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. A statu- ette probably once surmounted the cover, which was added to the cup in 1610 ; but this has been broken off. The belt of foliage around the upper part of the cup is just what is found upon the communion cups of this period. Before passing to the seventeenth century a few words must be said of cups of exceptional form or material. Ivory standing cups are sometimes found, and of these the best known example is the celebrated cup called Thomas a Becket’s,* long at ■No. 63. — STANDING CUP (1569), AT CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, CAM- BRIDGE. * It now belongs to His Grace the Duke of Norfolk. CHAP. X.] Standing Cups . 253 Corby Castle. This is a very ancient ivory cnp bearing the initials TB and a mitre, from which it has been supposed that it may have belonged to the saint and archbishop him- self ; hut although very old, it can hardly be referred to as early a date as the twelfth century, and the mounting is of the reign of Henry VIII. The date-letter on the mount, which is all of the same style, is the Lombardic H of 1525, the date properly assigned to it many years ago by Mr. Octa- vius Morgan. The interesting history of the cup, which was given by Sir Edward Howard, Lord High Admiral, to Queen Katherine of Arragon, and afterwards reverted to the Earl of Arundel, points to the date at which it was mounted in its present fashion, and coincides happily with the hall-mark. The style of the belt, which bears in Lombardic character the inscription vinum . tvvm . bibe . cvm . gavdio, and the groundwork of the letters, which also carries the hall-mark, closely correspond with the inscribed bands on the chalice at Trinity College, Oxford, and the Narford mazer, which are of the years 1527 and 1582 respectively. It probably be- longed to some fifteenth cen- tury bishop, perhaps to that great prelate Thomas Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1454 to 1486, and a Cardinal. No. 6±. — THE CHAPMAN CUP (1580), AT ARMOURERS’ HALL, LONDON. 254 Old English Plate. [CHAP. X. Early in tlie reign of Elizabeth, cups are found fashioned as gourds or melons, with feet formed as their twisted stems and tendrils. The CHAP. X.] Standing Czips. 255 Armourers’ Company and the Honourable Society of the pinner Temple each have one, the former of the year 1585, the latter dated 1568. Cups, too, shaped as birds and other animals, their heads taking off to form them into drink- ing vessels, sometimes occur. The set of fine large cups formed as cocks, and called the “Cockayne” cups of the Skinners’ Com- pany, are the best known examples of these. They were made in 1605. The pea-hen cup of the same Guild is as cha- racteristic as the Cock- ayne cups ; the en- graving of it (No. 65), conveys a good idea of this class of cup gene- rally. It was pre- sented by the widow of one Peacock. In both these cases the name of the donor has of course suggested the design for the No. 66. -DOUBLE CUP (17TH CENTURY), AT VINTNERS* HALL, LONDON. cup. In Germany drink- ing cups often took these and other quaint shapes, such as wind- mills, at about this time, and until the middle of the following century. The windmills seem always of foreign origin, but another favourite cup is found of English make as well as German. These are the well-known ones, Old English Plate . [CHAr. X. No. 67. — THE EDMONDS CUP (1613), AT CARPENTERS’ HALL, LONDON. sometimes called “ wager cups,” in the form of a woman, holding a smaller cup over her head with upstretched arms. A very beau- tiful seventeenth century cup of this kind is amongst the plate of the Vintners’ Company, an en- graving of which is given (No. 66). It is not quite certain whether it is of English or foreign work- manship. They are all very much alike. A little later another very dis- tinctive fashion prevailed. The “ Edmonds ” cup of the Car- penters’ Company is an admirable illustration of it (No. 67). This is one of four valuable cups, all much alike, in the possession of the company, given by the war- dens whose names they hear. The foot is much like those of earlier cups, but the stem is different, being formed as acanthus or other leaves, the upper part of it baluster- shaped. It forms a link between the Elizabethan and the plain baluster stems which are so often found in the seventeenth century. The bowl is as characteristic of its period as the stem, the pointed shape being general for a time, and the covers of all these cups are surmounted by three brackets bear- ing a triangular spire of pierced work ending in a spear-head as shown in the engraving. This “Ed- monds ” cup was given in 1613, and was made that same year : the others are of 1609, 1611 and 1628. Mag- nificent cups of this period and CHAP* X,] Standing Cups . 257 fashion are in use as chalices at Odcombe, co. Somerset, at Bodmin in Cornwall, and several other places. The Armourers’ Company have two very similar cups, called the “ Leycroft ” and the “ Foster ” cup, the former of 1608, and the Old English Plate . [chap. X. 258 latter of 1681 ; and the Trinity House other two of the years 1611 and 1627 respectively. These dates serve to plainly mark the in- terval within which these cups remained in full vogue. The covers in each of these instances are surmounted by openwork pyramidal spires, those at the Trinity House being supported by mermaids. A cup of this fashion, gilt, and weighing 46 oz., was sold at Christie and Manson’s Rooms in June, 1875, for ^£200, or about four and a half guineas an ounce. A specimen of 1689, now bereft of its spire, is to he seen in the Treasury of the Czar at Moscow ; and a stray example of as late a date as 1646, called the “ Rawlinson ” cup, is at Vintners’ Hall. This is the very last known to the writer. To these succeeded a much less artistic form of cup, which held its own, however, much longer, being found from about 1638 to 1694, the dates of the earliest and latest of them that have been noted. The engraving (No. 68) is taken from one of the year 1655, which was once the property of the Blacksmiths’ Company, hut found its way into the Bernal Collection and thence to Mr. Dexter. At the Dexter sale it passed to Messrs. Hancocks for no less a sum than -£378, and it is now in the fine collection of Sir F. A. Milbank. It is about twelve inches high, and stands on a large circular foot. Its stem is of somewhat exceptional form, being a figure of Vulcan. In the general run of the examples known of this pattern of cup the stems are plain balusters. The howls of a great many of them are covered with granulated ornament, as shown in the engraving, and are of the same shape, whilst a few are chased with a hand of upright acanthus foliage round the lower part. Most of the City Companies, the Trinity House, and the Inns of Court are supplied with one or more of these favourite loving cups, which were made in great numbers for more than half a century. It is not to he supposed, however, that there was no demand for a more decorated style of cup, especially in the festive reign of Charles II. Cups of the greatest magnificence are found of that period, of which two examples may he given to show what the Caroline gold- smith could accomplish. The “ Royal Oak ” grace cup (No. 69) was presented by the merry monarch to the Barber-Surgeons’ Company in 1676. It is 16 J inches high, including the cover, and is formed as an oak-tree, the howl being supported by the trunk and branches. It is profusely ornamented with chased leaves and garlands, and has an arched royal crown as a cover. No. 69. THE ROYAL OAK CUP (1676), AT BARBER-SURGEONS’ HALL, LONDON. S 2 No. 70 .— THE PEPYS CUP ( 1677 ), at CLOTHWOKKERs’ HALL, LONDON. CHAP. X.] Two-handled Standing Cups . 261 The other example is the cup (No. 70) given by Samuel Pepys to the Clothworkers’ Company. It is of about the same date as the last, 1677, but of greater size, being 23 inches high, and 166 ounces in weight. Its general shape is much like that of the plainer loving cups on baluster- stems which have already been described ; but in this case No. 71. — TWO-HANDLED CUP AND COVEN (1739), BY PAUL LAMERIE, AT GOLDSMITHS’ HALL, LONDON. the plain bowl is surrounded by a removable silver casing of pierced flowers and scrolls of very elaborate and beautiful work, and the foot and baluster- stem are ornamented in a similar manner. This may bring us to the eighteenth century, and the simple but massive two-handled cups with covers that, mark the reigns of Queen Anne and the earlier part of the Georgian period. These seem to have been the only cups made for a long time, and they are of every size and degree of finish, from those of simplest workmanship up to the beautiful specimen by the master hand of 262 [chap. X. Old English Plate. Paul Lamerie, from which our illustration (No. 71) of the class is taken, by permission of the Goldsmiths’ Company. It is one of the best possible examples of a well-known form of cup, of the decoration of the period, and of the work of this celebrated artist, who flourished from 1712, when he entered into business, till No. 72. — CUP (1795), AT MERCHANT TAYLORS’ HALL, LONDON. liis death in the summer of 1751. It may be remarked that his fame was fairly and honourably earned by the personal attention he seems to have devoted to his art throughout his whole career. Much of the beautiful work which bears his mark must have been executed by his own hand, for it appears from his will, which, dated in May and proved in August, 1751, gives us the period of his death within a few weeks, that he kept only two journeymen, to one of whom, Samuel CHAP. X.] Tankards . 263 Collins, lie entrusted the duty of preparing his unfinished plate for sale by auction for the benefit of his widow and three daughters. That he had no son accounts for the disappearance of the name from the books of the Goldsmiths’ Company. He was of French extraction, as his name and the names of the personal friends who were his executors sufficiently denote. He worked under the name of Lamerie, but used the prefix “ de ” in signing his last will. No special forms or fashions can be identified with any particular period from the middle of the last century onwards, if we except the oval-pointed cups, sometimes fluted, but more often ornamented with hanging festoons sometimes carried over medallions, which are also found on Wedgwood ware of the time of Flaxman. The potters and the goldsmiths have often copied each other’s designs, or else have resorted to the same designers ; and as in the reign of William III. Staffordshire ware made by the well-known John Philip Elers, from 1690 onwards, reproduced the Chinese ornament patronised by the goldsmiths a decade earlier, so now Flaxman and his school influenced the goldsmiths’ work of the day almost as much as the ornamentation of ceramic ware, with which his name is more popularly associated. The Wedgwood ware, for which Flaxman for many years furnished models, won extraordinary fame. It is not so generally known that the same great artist was employed also by Rundell and Bridge, the goldsmiths, notwithstanding the fine examples executed by them after his designs that are at Windsor Castle and other places. No better illustration of the style could be found than the vase- like cup which has been selected for our engraving (No. 72), It is one of a pair made in the year 1795, and is the property of the Merchant Taylors’ Company, by whose permission it has been engraved. It is generally admitted that the goldsmiths of the nineteenth century in England are not behind those of days gone by, and have of late years even outstripped their continental brethren in an art which is capable of so much. TANKARDS. The use of the word “ tankard,” in its now familar sense of a large silver drinking vessel with a cover and handle, is of comparatively modern introduction. No article of plate is called by this name in any of the volumes of wills and inventories published by the Surtees Society, which reach down to the year 1600. The word seems to first occur in this sense about 1575, and from that time is constantly 264 Old English Plate . [chap. X. applied to tlie vessels that have ever since been known as tankards. In earlier days it was used for the wooden tubs hound with iron, and containing ^ some three gallons, in which water was carried. The men who fetched water from the conduits in London were called “ tankard- bearers,” and in a Coroner’s Roll of 1276, for the ward of Castle Bay- No. 73. — TANKARD (1574), AT THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM, OXFORD. nard, tankards are mentioned as the vessels they bore. This roll sets forth that one Grene a water-carrier, who had come to St. Paul’s Wharf, “cu quodam tancardo,” intending to take up water with it, entered a boat there and after filling the tankard attempted to place it on the wharf, but the weight of the water in the tankard making the boat move away as ho was standing on its hoard, he fell into the water between the boat and the wharf, and was drowned, as the coroner found, by misadventure.* * Coroner’s Roll, 17 June, 4 Edw. I. — Riley’s Memorials of London and London Life , CHAP. X.] Tankards . 265 Again in 1337, the keepers of the conduits receive a sum of money for rents for “tynes and tankards,” thereat; and in 1350 a house is hired for one year at 10s. to put the tankards — les tanqers — in, and two irons costing 2s. 6d. were bought for stamping them.* These same utensils are found in farming accounts of the same No. 74. — THE POISON TANKARD (CIRCA 1565), AT CLARE COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. period. In 1294 at Framlingham, co. Suffolk, the binding with iron of thirteen tankards costs 3s., and six years later, a three-gallon iron- bound tankard is priced in Cambridge at Is. At Leatherhead a two- gallon tankard is valued at 2 cl. in 1338, and two such vessels at Elham together cost 4tf. in 13G4. f All this time tankards are mentioned in no other connection ; but when we come to the sixteenth century, a notice of “ lether ” tankards occurs. This is in a church account of 1567, and they were no doubt * Riley’s Memorials , &c., pp. 201, 265. t Prof. Rogers’ History of Agriculture and Prices in England Vol. II. pp. 577, o08, 571, 573. 266 Old English Plate . [CHAP. X. ft ft 1 1 Wm used as fire-buckets. A churchwardens’ inventory of the same period (1566) speaks of a “penny tanckerd of wood used as a holy-water stock.” Even later than this, tankards appear in household accounts classed with other kitchen goods, for an inventory of the chattels of one Edward Waring, Esq., of Lea, taken in 1625, includes “two tankerds and one payle,” certainly not amongst his plate. Sometime before this, however, the term was occasionally applied to silver vessels. The will of Sir George Heron of Harbottell, proved at Durham in 1576 or thereabouts, mentions his “three silver tanck- ards ” valued at vi li. ; and in a Norwich will of 1588, there is an entry of “ one Canne or Tanckerd of sylver.” In the inventory of the plate of Dr. Perne, Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge, which is of the year 1589, occur the following articles.* Item a tankerd barred lipt and covered v ounces xxiiijs. ijd. Item a white home tankerd with a cover barres and lipt double gilt vi ounces xxis. Ms ft f®1§ i * -f> * i h— ■ =- > No. 75. — TANKARD (1618), IN THE POSSESSION OF THE CORPORATION OF NORWICH. These are some of the earliest instances of a then new application of the word, which soon not only became common, but entirely super- seded the old. It was, after all, not very unnatural to transfer a word originally used for a capacious water-tub, to a drinking vessel that was also large of its kind, and it is difficult to understand why etymologists should have taken so much trouble, as they have, to find fanciful derivations * Camb. Univ. Registry Drawer, 13. Kindly communicated by A. P. Humphry, Esq. CHAP. X.] Tankards. 267 twang “ tankard” from tin- or sound tlie lid for it. Duchat and Thomson would both derive quart , and Dr. Thomas Henshaw from the makes on shutting it down ; but, after all, if tank is derived, as it surely is, from the French estang, a pond or pool, it is not necessary to go further for a derivation of the name of a vessel which was origi- nally intended to hold water than to connect it with tank, and derive it from the same source. Johnson’s Dictionary describes it as “a large vessel for strong drink,” and cites Ben Jon- son : “Hath his tankard touched your brain ? ” One of the ear- liest extant speci- mens of what we should now call a tankard is preserved at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (see page 180). It is of the year 1571, and is elaborately ornamented with arabesque hands of repousse and en- graved work. The Ashmolean Museum at Oxford has a beau- tiful example of 1574 (No. 78). more than six or seven inches No. 76. — TANKARD (1634), THE PROPERTY OP THE CORPO- RATION OP BRISTOL. These are both of moderate size, not high, and the Oxford example tapers a good deal from the bottom upwards. The “ Poison Cup ” at Clare College, Cambridge (No. 74), which has already been mentioned in another connection, is a glass tankard 268 Old English Plate . [chap. x. enclosed in silver filigree casing of about the same date as the last. To these succeed the taller, upright, and straightsided tankards, often beautifully ornamented, that are found in the reigns of James I. and Charles I. One of these, belonging to the corporation of Norwich, and made in the year 1618, is given on p. 266 (No. 75). The drum is repousse, ornamented with strapwork, forming diamond divisions, which are Med with flowers and fruit, and with medallions bearing the usual marine monsters of the period. This is strikingly like a flagon of the year 1619, which has been referred to before, at Kensington parish church. A pair of similar fashion and of the same date are at Bodmin Church, and another pair, perhaps more elaborate, are amongst the valuable possessions of the Corporation of Bristol. These last are of 1684 (No. 76). Later tankards are plainer, and are of constant occurrence. Seven- teenth-century inventories frequently mention them, and plenty of specimens are still in existence. A splendid pair, from one of which our engraving (No. 77) is taken, CHAP. X.] Smaller Cups. 269 came into the possession of the Merchant Taylors’ Company in London, on the dissolution of a Dublin Guild some years ago, and they show round the lower part of the drum the acanthus-leaf ornament which is so characteristic of the time at which they were made. They bear the Dublin hall-marks for 1680. A note as to prices may not be inappropriate. From an early account-book of the Clockmakers’ Company it may be quoted that a pair of tankards, ordered to be bought at about this time, and weighing together 100 oz., cost ^081 19s. 5d. These domestic tankards of the second half of this century are very plain, often of great diameter in proportion to their depth, and have flat lids and very massive handles, the lower part of the latter often being notched to form them into whistles. They came in at the Eestoration, and are found till about 1710 or 1720, when a pot with swelling drum and dome-shaped lid, with or without a knob, was introduced, of a fashion so well known at the present day, both in silver and pewter, that it is unnecessary to describe it more fully. The tankards of the last century, are perhaps as often without lids as with them, and examples of the more usual shapes in pewter may be seen in every tavern. It has already been remarked that the so-called flagons used ordi- narily in English churches are, properly speaking, tankards, and the origin of the application of the word flagon to them has been explained in the previous chapter. Tankards of the tall, highly ornamented kind will be found in the chronological list at the years 1G18, 1619, 1634, a plain one of the same shape at 1634 ; and the ordinary flat, -lidded tankard at 1664, 1666, 1669, and onwards. SMALLER CUPS. INCLUDING TAZZE, BEAKERS, TASTERS, CAUDLE-CUPS, PORRINGERS, TUMBLERS, ETC. Side by side with the standing cups, which were often more fitted for decorating the “ cup -board ” than for use except on state occasions, and bearing the same relation to them that the trencher-salt did to the standing salt-cellar, are found a number of smaller cups and basins adapted for every-day requirements. A short chronological notice of their forms will perhaps be of more practical use to the collector than the preceding section ; for whilst standing cups are seldom for sale, and when they are, command prices that are beyond the reach of any 270 Old English Plate. [chap. X. but tlie very wealthy, good specimens of smaller drinking cups are more easy of acquisition. Tazze. — Very elegant cups, usually on baluster-stems and with bowls shaped like the low open champagne glasses of nineteenth- century use, are found from about 1570 till the outbreak of the Civil War in the reign of Charles I. Specimens of these are much prized by the collector, and they are hy no means common, though the Ar- mourers’ Company are fortunate enough to possess a number of them. Their bowls are often punched all over with small bosses in rings or other patterns from the outside, decreasing in size towards the centre and somewhat resem- bling the designs now produced by engine-turning. This was possibly in imitation of the Venetian glasses which were much used for drink at this period by those who could afford them. One of 1599, the property of Mr. Octavius Morgan, is so ornamented ; and several of the Armourers’ Company cups are similarly treated. Others have plain bowls, or have a simple band of ornament round the rims, such as may be ob- served in the case of the beautiful example of which a woodcut is given (No. 78). This is of the year 1688. Tasters are the small shallow circular bowls with a flat handle that are sometimes called bleeding-basins, but incorrectly, the latter being a different class of vessel, sometimes found in nests. They are con- stantly mentioned in the plate-lists of Elizabethan days, but rarely earlier than 1570, nor more than a single one in each list. Item a white taster xiij cranes, iij quarters, iij li., vi s., vi d. Item a white taster with a cover xiiij ouncs and one quarter, iij li., viii s. Inv. of Dr. Perne, Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge, 15S9. A silver bowl called le Taster is mentioned in a Bristol will of 1408, and in another of 1545 a “ taster of silver waing by estymacion vi. ounces ” occurs. Half-way between these dates “ a taster with a cover ” CHAP. X.] Beakers . 271 is included in an inventory of 1487,* but this was in all proba- bility a cup of assay. The ordinary tasters weighed about three ounces, and were valued at about ten or twelve shillings. The extant specimens are mostly of the middle or end of the seventeenth century. Bleeding-basins of the first years of the eighteenth century about 4J inches in diameter, and having a single flat pierced handle, are not uncommon. They are found of pewter as well as of silver. Beakers. — These come next in order, occurring first at the very beginning of the seventeenth century ; a few may be found of earlier but not much earlier date, though their names occur long before in inventories. In England, at all events, they are more often seen in the cabinet of the collector than amongst the an- cient treasures of great people or great corporations, a fact which must be left to explain itself as best it can. Early foreign examples are more common. They are usually Butch, or from the north of Europe. Br. Johnson derived the word from beak , and defined the beaker as a cup with a spout in form of a bird’s beak, an opinion shared also by Skinner. Other authorities content themselves with saying that it was a kind of vessel probably derived from Flanders or Ger- many, without fixing its shape ; and Forby would trace it to the Saxon bece, ordinary drinking vessels being made of beech-wood. The learned de Laborde connects the English word by her with the French buket; giving for authority cases in which the latter is used for a holy-water bucket, and for a large cup of silver with cover, enamelled in the bottom. The vessels commonly called beakers are plain upright drinking cups, widening at the mouth and without spout or handle, somewhat resembling the tall glass tumblers used in modern times for soda-water and the like. The engraving is taken from those of the Mercers’ Company, dated 1604 (No. 79). A beaker of 1609, with belts and flower- No. 79. — BEAKER (1604), AT MER- CERS’ HALL, LONDON. * Inv. of Robert Morton, gent., 3 Henry VII., Brit. Mus. Add. M.S. 30,064, Arch. Jour. XXXIII. 321. 272 Old English Plate . [CHAP. X. scrolls engraved round the top, is used as a communion cup at Armathwaite, in Cumberland ; and another of 1598 is at Llanfyllin, N. Wales. 1346. ciphum meum biker argenti. Will of a canon of York. — Test. Ebor. 1348. Bikers, cups intended for ladies, see Beltz, Memorials of the Order of the Garter , p. 385. 1379. un hanap tour de beker. 1399. two bikers of silver gilt, 29| oz., one other biker gilt, 16 oz. (amongst the stock of a jeweller’s shop in Cheapside).* 1446. vi bikkez diversarum sectarum, It m xiij bikkes cum ij cooperculis, It m xij bik’kez antiqua. — Inv. of Durham Priory. 1582. a sylver backer. — Bich. Wills. 1604, 1605. Plain gilt beakers, each ornamented with three maidens’ heads on the sides (see engraving No. 79). — Mercers’ Company. 1625. one white beaker. —Inv. of Edward Waring of Lea, Esq. V-shaped cups on baluster- stems were very common from about 1G10 to 1G60. They are very like the ordinary wine-glasses of the present day, but are some- what larger. Communion cups, as well as secular drinking cups, are often found of this shape. An example in pewter has been given in the chapter upon ecclesiastical plate, p. 175. With these may be classed the very small hexagonal or octagonal grace-cups on high stems that are found in the reign of James I. These are quite peculiar to that period. Specimens are preserved at Christ’s Hospital, and by the Armourers’ Company. They seem to occur in sets of three. Caudle-cups and Porringers. — These two classes of vessels, the former of which were often called “ posset” cups or “posnets,” include all the two-handled cups with covers, and sometimes also trays or stands, that were so commonly used in the seventeenth and the earlier part of the following century. No. 80. — CAUDLE-CUP (1654), AT CLOTHWORKERS HALL, LONDON. * It may be noted that his whole stock in trade consisted of 132 oz., valued at 2s. id. an ounce. Riley’s Memorials of London and London Life , p. 550. CHAP. X.] Caudle- Cups and Porringers. 273 The former are somewhat pear-shaped, swelling into larger howls at the base, and were used for drinking posset, which was milk curdled with wine and other additions, like our own wliite-wine whey and treacle possets. The curd floated above the liquor, and, rising into the narrow part of the cup, could be easily removed, leaving the clear fluid at the bottom. Their fashion differs with their date. A well-known pattern, which came in at about the time of the Restoration, is shown in the engraving (No. 80). This is one of three such cups at Clothworkers’ Hall. Lincoln’s Inn also possesses some, No. 81. — CAUDLE-CUP (1670), IN THE POSSESSION OF EARL BATHURST. and there are many at Oxford, where they are used in college halls as beer-cups. In the gayer times of the merry monarch, they are of more elaborate design ; many are ornamented very boldly with flowers and monsters in repousse work. A beautiful example, of the year 1670, is engraved (No. 81), by the kind permission of its owner, Earl Bathurst. Porringers, on the other hand, were wider-mouthed bowls, but with covers and handles like the last. Their less flowing shape necessitated a somewhat different style of treatment in the way of decoration ; and they are sometimes found, in the middle of the century, octagonal or even twelve- sided, without any ornament. From about 1665 to 1685 they are often decorated with flat applique leaves round the bottom of the bowl and the knop of the cover. These thin plates of metal, cut into various shapes and applied to the surface, have been called by Mr. Octavius Morgan “ cut-card ” work, for want T 274 Old English Plate. [CHAP. X. of a better name, and it has been somewhat generally adopted. The engraving is of a very good specimen exhibited in the Loan Collection of 1862 by the late Paul Butler, Esq. (No. 82). The cover is furnished with three small projecting handles that form feet if the cover is used as a tray or saucer for the cup, for which, as well as for a cover, it is adapted. Some bowls are decorated with the upright acanthus leaf as found No. 82. — PORRINGER (1674). on the great tankards of the Merchant Taylors’ Company in 1680, of which an engraving has been given, No. 77. This acanthus ornament was much in vogue for a short time, say from 1675 to 1685. Another well-known but as short-lived style of decoration covered everything with Chinese figures in engraved work (see woodcut, No. 88). The mania for Chinese porcelain which prevailed for a few years in the reign of William III., and affected even the queen herself, has been immortalised by the satirists of the day. It did not die out before the goldsmiths first and the potters following them had covered their wares with Chinese designs. Upon Elers ware of about 1690 is found a whole series of representations illustrating the cultivation and use of the tea-plant, an old and a young viceroy of Canton, and the like. A vast quantity of plate was decorated in this way in the years 1682, 1688, and 1684, and a few pieces are found up to about 1690, CHAP. X.] Porringers . 275 but not much later. Amongst other specimens is the small gold cup found in the lake at Knowsley, and already mentioned as one of the few articles of gold exhibited at South Kensington in 1862. It was then catalogued as of “circa 1650.” This is surely too early, especially as the maker’s mark, KL, is well known, and agrees with the usual date of Chinese decoration, haying been noted 011 plate from 1680 to 1698. It is fair, however, to say that the writer has not had a recent opportunity of examining the cup itself. A small tankard, with the same sort of engraving, is in the South Kensington Museum ; but the barrel is of one year, the No. 83. — FLUTED PORRINGER (1699). cover of the next, and the decoration ten or fifteen years later than either.* Last of all come the fluted porringers of the reign of Queen Anne, of which it is necessary to say that, as they have much attracted the attention of collectors, imitations of them have been manufactured by the cart-load. These modern copies would very often be detected by an assay, for they are all marked as made of the Britannia standard of silver, and many of them if tested would no doubt prove to be of silver of lower quality. Their period almost exactly coincides with the first quarter of the eighteenth century. An engraving is given of a good example selected from a large collection of these porringers in the possession of B. Temple Frere, Esq. (No. 88). Tumblers. — These useful articles have been rather pushed out of * As of the Chinese period, but rather earlier than the kind of engraving mentioned above, being of the year 1674, may be men- tioned a set of three large silver vases, and two tall beakers, given to Horace Walpole by the Lady Betty Germain, and sold at the Strawberry Hill sale. They are of the form of the blue and white Chinese porcelain sets, which are sometimes arranged on the top of library book-cases. They are of great size ; the jars twenty inches high, and twelve inches in diameter, and the beakers fourteen inches high. They passed through the hands of Messrs. Lambert, to the last Mar- quess of Breadalbane in 1857. There are others at Knole of about the same date. T 2 276 Old English Plate. [chap. X. their place in the chapter by the necessity of classing together porringers and candle-cups ; for they are decidedly more ancient than the last-mentioned class of porringers. They are so called because they will not lie on their side but will only rest on the bottom, tumbling or rolling from side to side like a tumbler, till they steady themselves in an upright position. The name has somewhat im- properly been transferred to our flat-bottomed drinking glasses. Such round-bottomed cups are frequently met with from about 1670 onwards, and are used in some of the colleges at Oxford for drinking beer. They were sometimes called bowls, and, being of different sizes, the larger ones were called beer-bowls, and the smaller wine-bowls, in old inventories. “ Bolles ” are mentioned from very early times. “ vi Ciphos vocat. bolles de argento ” were left by Robert Cheddre of Bristol, to his son Richard, in 1882, and they constantly occur afterwards. PLATES. Plates of silver or silver-gilt were used both at dinner and at what is now called dessert. The dessert-plates are the more common, though silver “ trenchers ” are sometimes mentioned, as for instance in the will of Christopher Urswyke, Rector of Hackney, co. Midx., who died in 1521. The “ conceites after dinner,” such as “ appels, nuts, or creame,” * were no doubt placed upon them. Silver “ spice-plates ” occur in the inventories of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries : one of the earliest is of a “ plate argenti pro speciebus imponendis,” in a list dated 1858. f Two or three known sets of small silver plates, parcel- gilt and elaborately engraved, are of the middle of the sixteenth century. One of these sets, consisting of twelve plates, the borders engraved with medallions, heads, flowers and other ornaments of the Elizabethan period, and the centres with the labours of Hercules after Aldegraver, was sold by auction at Messrs. Christie and Manson’s rooms in the summer of 1876 for d£480, a price far below their real value. They are of the year 1567, and once belonged to the Cottons of Connington, one of whom was that great antiquary, Sir Robert Cotton, Bart., the collector of the Cottonian Library. They were oddly enough catalogued for sale and sold as of 1667, and as engraved by Magdalene de Passe, one of the celebrated family of engravers of that name. The well-known signa- ture of MP in monogram, which some of the set bear, almost certainly Hugh Rhodes, Boke of Nurture, 1577. t Test, Ebor. 1358, CHAP. X.] Plates. 2? 7 signifies Peter Maas, who is known to have worked after Aldegraver’s designs, although it is described as that of “ un graveur inconnu ” in some of the best dictionaries. Other engravings by the same hand and bearing the same mark are dated 1577. These very plates had supplied Mr. Octavius Morgan many years ago with the shape of the small old English ft proper to the year 1567. Similar plates of the years 1568 and 1569 have also been noted by Mr. Morgan, as in the possession some years since of Messrs. Thomas of New Bond Street. This class of plate will not fail to remind the antiquary of those curious sets of little painted sycamore- wood trenchers, which he knows by the name of “ roundels.” Much has been said of these interesting objects, and the learning on the subject has been lately collected in a contribution to the Portfolio (Sept. 1885), by Mr. A. H. Church. Their use and the meaning of the posies upon them has been alike discussed, but possibly the simplest explanation is the best, that they were for serving fruit or cheese. More than one reference of Elizabethan date quoted by Mr. Church points to this, and no doubt the silver plates were used for the same purposes. Dinner plates of silver with shaped and gadrooned edge, are found commonly in the last, and sometimes of the preceding, century, replacing the simple pewter of an earlier generation. For the reason of this we must appeal for a second time to Prof. Wilson. North. Deep must be the foundation and strong the superstructure, of that friendship which can sustain the shock of seeing its object eating mock-turtle soup from a plate of imitation silver. Shepherd. Meaner than pewter ! * There was no “ imitation silver ” to fall back upon in the seven- teenth century, and pewter becoming in the reign of Charles II. too mean for the times, the only substitute was silver itself. Dishes and dinner-plates of this more costly material accordingly began to make their appearance. Prince Rupert buys five dozen plates, amongst other things, of Alderman E. Backwell in 1670, and Prince George of Denmark 24 plates and 24 trenchers of Child and Rogers in 1686. These plates weighed 17| ounces each, and were paid for at the rate of 5s. 8 cl. per ounce. The trenchers were 21 ounces each, and cost the same per ounce as the plates. Very early examples are the plates of the year 1686, still to be found amongst the family plate of the Earls Bathurst. Lord St. Oswald has a set of as early a year as 1697, part of it Nodes Ambrosiance , No. XXXI, Old English Plate . [chap. X. 278 made by one Chadwick, and the rest by a smith named Gibson. A very similar set of 1732, bearing the maker’s mark known as Paul Crespin’s, belongs to Lord Hotham. After that they are of common occurrence. An enormous number, with dishes to match, were made by Paul Lamerie for the Mansion House in 1737, and are in regular use there. FORKS. These are a modern invention compared with spoons ; so much so that, to avoid doing our ancestors grave injustice, we shall be glad to agree with the learned de Laborde, who, speaking of forks, and remembering that the exquisites of Greece and Rome all ate with their fingers, concluded that the use of forks at meals is rather a conventional matter than a test by which to measure the advance of civilization. Certain it is that no mention of forks is to be found in our fifteenth- century treatises on etiquette and manners ; whilst in early wills and inventories no forks ever occur, except now and then one or two mounted in crystal or other ornamental handles, and used for eating pears or green ginger. These had usually two prongs only. The Boke of Kervyncj, directing the servitor to “ laye your knyves and set your brede one lofe by an other your spones and your napkyns fayre folden besyde your brede,” would have told him where to dispose his forks, had there been any ; and the Boke of Nurture in 1577 would have included them in its caution against the improper use of the knife which runs as follows : Pick not thy teeth with thy knyfe nor with thy fyngers end, But take a stick, or some cleane thyng then doe you not offende. Again, the Young Childrens Book only warns its readers not to play with * ‘ spone trencher ne knyffe, ’ ’ not adding fork. Even later than this, the long and detailed inventory of the goods of Dr. Perne, Master of Peterliouse, Cambridge, which is dated 10 May, 1589, only mentions one fork, but spoons and every other sort of table-plate in abundance. The entry mentioning this single fork is rather a curious one. Item, a peece of plate having in it a chasinge dyshe vj spones one forke ij gobletts ij cuppes ij saltes vi trenchers and a pepper box, all waying vii xx xj ounces — xxxvii 15 . The common use of the fork was introduced from Italy about the beginning of the seventeenth century ; and a well-known passage from Coryat’s Crudities has been often cited as the first mention of forks in England* That gentleman, describing in 1611 his travels in CHAP. X.] Forks . 279 Europe, notes the “ little fork” used by the Italians instead of their fingers when they cut meat out of the dish, and records how he was called furcifer by a friend when he continued the use of his fork on his return home. Their Italian origin is also referred to by Ben Jonson, who, speaking of the manners of Venice, puts into the mouth of Sir Politick Would-be — , . . Then you must learn the use And handling of your silver fork at meals. Volpone or the Fox, Act IV. Sc. 1. This was written in 1607, but a few years later (1616) the same writer speaks of them as known in England. Sledge. Forks 1 what be they ? Meek. The laudable use of forks, Brought into custom here, as they are in Italy, To the sparing of napkins. The Devil is an Ass, Act V. Sc. 3. Massinger too, about the same time, recognises the use of the fork in polite society : — I have all that’s requisite To the making up of a signior ... .... and my silver fork To convey an olive neatly to my mouth. The Great Duhe of Florence , Act III. This fork for eating olives might be one of the more ancient kind, but at all events the employment of dinner-forks was now becoming more general, and a fork was added to the knife and spoon which most persons seem to have carried about with them for their own use wherever they went. The same knife, fork, and spoon no doubt served for the whole meal, perhaps wiped and sometimes washed, for few families had any great number, especially of forks. The large dinner-forks which we now call “ table” forks are said to have been first used in France by the Duke de Montausier, circa 1645. Prince Kupert purchased 24 forks with his plates in 1670, and Prince George of Denmark a dozen in 1686, besides his plates and trenchers. These cost, the spoons, two shillings apiece for the making, and the forks two shillings and sixpence, besides the silver at 5s. 2 d. per ounce. A set of twelve forks amongst the domestic plate at Cotehele was made in 1667, and it is believed that these are the oldest now in use. They were probably all that the Sir Bichard Edgcumbe of that day possessed, and were no doubt considered an unusually handsome equipage. They have plain flat handles like the spoons of the period, of which the spoon No. 2 in the engraving given at page 199 is an example ; but the tops are not so much cleft, the two side projections 28 o Old English Plate . [chap. X. being rounded off like the central one. One of the handles is lengthened out to form a marrow-spoon. Another such set is men- tioned by Yiscount Gort in Notes and Queries , as bought by one of his ancestors, in 1698, of a Dublin silversmith named Bolton, whose account for them was as follows : — “ For 12 forks, wt. 30 oz. 14 dwt. at 6s. 10rf. per oz., 4>10 10s.” There are only seven forks in a long Tredegar inventory of 1676. A split-ended, flat-handled fork of the year 1683 with four prongs has been dug up in the grounds of Eden Hall. It bears the Musgrave crest engraved in the fashion of that day, and if genuine it must take rank as the most ancient English four-pronged table-fork known. Most probably, however, this fork has been fashioned out of a spoon. When the custom arose, most likely in the early part of last century, of the host supplying his own table with the plate requisite for the use of his guests, a much larger quantity was needed, and more and more as time went on. Mr. Octavius Morgan suggests that a great deal of old-fashioned, unused plate — ewers and basins and the like — was, about a century ago, melted down to supply this new want ; and that the magnificent services of gilt and silver plate which were then made for royal and other tables were provided in this way. An enormous quantity of metal must have been required to provide silver for the number of plates, dishes, sauce-boats (never found before the reign of George II.), spoons and forks, which were made by Bundell and Bridge, the Garrards, and other firms their immediate prede- cessors, and the spoon and fork makers of a hundred years ago ; and, as at that period old plate was not valued, everyone was glad to change antiquated silver articles for those of a newer and more useful fashion. This will partly account for the comparatively small quantity of ancient plate to be found in the plate-rooms and treasuries of the present day. The earliest dinner or table forks are three-pronged, but about the middle of the last century four-pronged forks came into fashion ; the earliest four-pronged forks known to the writer, except the Eden Hall fork above mentioned, are of the years 1726 and 1727, and are at Narford Hall, Norfolk, but they were not common before the reign of George the Third. The handles of modern forks follow the fashions of spoons. Notes of Forks, arranged in Chronological Order. 1300. unum par cultellorum cum manicis argenti aymellaf cum uno furchetto de Cristallo, — Wardrobe Accounts, 28 Edw. I. 1304. duo furchetti arg’ deaur’ et duo manubrise de cristallo.— Wardrobe Accounts, 32 Edw. I. CHAP. X.] Monteiths . 281 1349. Henrico filio meo . . . dimidiam duodenam furcarum argenti deauratarum ; Margarets filise meas . , . duas f ureas argenti deauratas. (Will of Henry Lord Percy.) — Test. Ebor. 1395. unum instrumentum argenteum pro zinzibo. — Idem. 1399. j furche darg’ poisant xv unc’ di’. It m ij furches p’ zinzibr’ v’t darg’ ennorrez. I m j fourche de beryle garnis darg’ enorrez debrusez. I m j large furche d’arg’ endorrez p’ ging r vert pois vi unc t di. It m j large fourche en p’tie endorrez meindre pois j unc’. — Treasury Accounts, 1 Hen. IY. 1443. ij forkes for grene gynger. (Will of Sir Hugh Willoughby.) — Test. Ebor. 1448. j grate arg’ pro zinzebro. 1463. my silver forke for grene ginger. — Bury Wills. 1487. ij gynger forkes. (Inv. of Robert Morton, gent.) — Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 30.064. 1498. a forke for grene gynger. (Will of Anne Lady Scrope.) — Test. Ebor. 1500. a prange of silver for grene gynger. — Will of Sir John Treffry, Knt. 1515. a silver spone wt a forke. — Norf. Archaeology. 1523. Itm too forkes with ther spones doble gylte to eete grene gynger with all. Itm one fork with hys spone parcell gylte to eete green gynger with all. Itm a forke of sylver doble gylte graved with lybertes on the end. — Inv. of Lady Hungerford, attainted 14 Hen. VIII. 1542. a longe forke of silver for sokett. (Will of Kateryne Ctessof Northumberland.) — Coll. Top. et Gen. 1554. spone wt a forke in the end. 1567. one long silver spone with a forke in the end double gilt. 1615. a knife a spoone and forke of a greene and white stone garnished with gold. (Inv. of Duke of Somerset.) — Loseley MSS. For more modern specimens see Chronological List, Appendix A, 1667, 1715, 1727, 1737, 1738. MONTEITHS. The Monteith was a puncli-bowl which seems to have come into fashion with the new standard silver of 1697 ora little earlier. It had a moveable rim, ornamented around the top with escallops or else battlements to form indentations, in which the glasses were placed with the feet outwards for the purpose of bringing them into the room without breaking. The bowl was of course brought in empty, the punch being made in the room, each gentleman fancying he had an especial talent for concocting the beverage, and a silver ladle and lemon-strainer were brought in with it. When the glasses were taken out, the bowl was placed on the table, the rim was removed, and the process of punch-making commenced. The pierced bowl of the old- fashioned wine- strainers (in general use when gentlemen decanted their own port wine in the parlour) served as a lemon- strainer, there being generally a small flat hook at the side of it, by which it was appended to the side of the bowl.* This particular pattern of punch- * The lemon- strainers with two long flat handles were no doubt also used with these bowls. 282 Old English Plate . [chap. X. bowl was so called after a gentleman of fashion, of the name of Mon- teith, who was remarkable for wearing a scalloped coat. New things produce new words, and so Monteith Has by one vessel saved himself from Death. King’s Art of Cookery. No. 84. — MONTEITH (1702) AT VINTNERS’ HALL, LONDON. Besides the characteristic rim, their fluted bowls should be noted, their gadrooned bases or feet, and the large rings hanging from lions’ mouths which are almost invariable, — the only exceptions known to the writer being the very earliest and the very latest specimens he has ever seen. The former has no handles, but all of the other charac- teristics of the true Monteith ; it is of 1696, and is the property of the Fishmongers’ Company. And the latter, which was given to the Clothworkers in 1718, by Sir John Bull, has bull’s-head handles instead of lions’ heads, the variation being, no doubt, adopted in allusion to the donor’s name. The engraving (No. 84) is of a Mon- teith in the possession of the Vintners’ Company. The following references clearly mark the period of their intro- duction, and comprise every Monteith that the writer has had the opportunity of examining; but to these must be added a good and very early specimen noted by Mr. Morgan, the property of the corporation of Newark. Its moveable rim is shaped like the top of a chess-castle, and it bears an inscription as follows : “ This Monteith and thirteen CHAP. X.] Candlesticks. 283 cups were given by the honourable Nicholas Saunderson of the Cor- poration of Newark upon Trent, a.d. 1689.” A Monteith appears in 1690 as a “ Mountbeth,” in a list of the plate at Tredegar. In a later inventory of 1698 it is spelled “ Montetli.” For others see Appendix A, 1696, 1698, 1699 (three specimens), 1700 (two specimens), 1702, 1707, 1718, 1716, and 1718. CANDELABBA, CANDLESTICKS, AND SCONCES. These are occasionally, but not very frequently, mentioned in wills, accounts, and other documents of every period. There is, however, No. 85. — CANDLESTICK (CIRCA 1670), AT PENIARTH. but little to be said about them that could not equally well be gathered from the subjoined lists. No really ancient specimens are known to exist in the precious metals, the earliest now to be found being the candlesticks shaped as fluted columns which are found in the reign of Charles II. (No. 85). They have square bases, which are sometimes 284 Old English Plate . [chap. x. cut oft' at the corners so as to become octagonal, and have also a pro- jection to match the base, but smaller, and a convenient distance above it, to serve as a knop by which to hold or carry them. In the time of William and Mary and of Queen Anne, the fashionable candlestick was equally simple, but with a baluster-stem, terminating in a square base, which has the corners cut off or else set back and rounded. Additional ornament was gra- dually added to the plain balus- ter. A candlestick of 1785 illustrates a transition period, after which, at about the middle of the last century, the baluster- stem, already a little modified as will be seen by the cut (No. 86), became much orna- mented with the oblique gad- rooning of Louis XY. taste. Towards 1765 it finally gave way to the Corinthian column pattern (No. 87), which was the first, it may be observed in passing, that is always found with removable socket-pans or nozzles. These Corinthian columns in turn were replaced by candlesticks ornamented with festoons of flowers, or No. 86.— candlestick (1735). drapery hanging between bosses or medallions which bear masks or other devices of the fashion introduced by those who designed for silversmiths and potters of the time of Josiah Wedg- wood. Removable nozzles are sometimes found on candlesticks of the reign of Geo. II., but not often. The sockets of the candlesticks of the later part of the century are, in many cases, shaped as vases ornamented with hanging wreaths. Silver sconces are very seldom seen ; there are good examples at Sudeley Castle, the back plate being repousse and having a single branch for the light ending in a tulip-shaped cup. They are of 1668. Prince Rupert buys six sconces of Alderman E. Backwell in 1670. At Knole a number of sconces are preserved, the back plates showing the Dorset arms and coronet in beaten- work. Some of them bear the CHAP. X.] Candelabra. 285 - Treasury Inv. 16 (Will of Sir Hugh w/p»v > .> London marks for 1685. The author has also seen a tiny toy-sconce by Anthony Nelme of the Queen Anne period bearing the arms of Bussell on the back plate in a lozenge. There is hardly a single entry of sconces in old-English wills; but it may be as well to say that “ un chandelier d’argent blanc, en maniere d’esconce,” occurs in the inventory of Charles V., which is ascribed by de Laborde to the year 1380. Notes of Candelabra, etc., arranged in Chronological Order. 1321. Chaundelabres. — Indenture of plate, 17 Edw. III. — vi candelabr’ arg. alb. et deaur. in pede. — Wardrobe Accounts temp. Edw. III. 1316. duos candelabras argenti. (Will of a Canon of York.) — Test. Ebor. 1100, candelabra. (Inv. of an Archdeacon of Richmond.) — Idem. 1138. an hond candilstikke. Henry YI. 1113. chaundeliers of silver. Willoughby.) — Test. Ebor. 1153. ij candilsticks of silver for qwerios parcel 1 gilt. (Will of John Lord Scrope.) — Idem. 1158. ij rounde chaundelers of silver, w l pykes. (Will of Sir Thos. Cheworth.) — Idem. 1527, four chaundelers, gilt prykettes, for a table, ciij oz. (Inv. of Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond.) — Camden Society. 1572. vi candlesticks. — Inv. of Thos. Lee of Mar- ton, co. Bucks. 1625. one small silver candlesticke. — Inv. of Ed- ward Waring of Lea. For more modern examples, see Ap- pendix A, 1668, 1685, 1690, 1699, 1715, 1716, 1721, 1734, 1735, 1759, 1775. No. 87. — CANDLESTICK (1773), AT NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD. TOILET SERVICES, AND BOUDOIR FURNITURE. The luxury of the later years of the Stuarts is suitably illustrated by the rich toilet services which are one of its creations. They came into fashion at about the Chinese period of which mention has been made, and more than one set is found decorated in that style. They usually consist of a number of pieces of silver or silver-gilt, a mirror with silver frame, candlesticks, snuffers and tray, pin-cushion, tazze, boxes for trinkets and soap, sometimes a basin and ewer, and a variety of other articles. The set at Knole is perhaps the best known of all. 286 Old English Plate. [chap. X. It is composed of a number of toilet-boxes and a table-mirror, tlie boxes plain oblong and octagonal with frosted panels, and tlieir covers bearing coronets and pierced ciphers fastened on with pins and nuts. The date of this service is 1673. There is also preserved at Knole a table entirely covered over with plaques of silver, beaten and chased with acanthus foliage, scrolls, amorini, etc. Like the toilet-boxes, it has coronets and pierced monograms attached in the same way ; in this case the initials are those of Frances Countess Dowager of Dorset and her second husband Henry Poole, Master of the Rolls, and M.P. for Cirencester. It was made in 1680. On each side of this table stand tall silver tripods (gueridons) for candlesticks, and above it hangs a mirror in silver framing to match the table. The tripods are of 1676, and the mirror was probably made at the same time as the table, being evidently of the same workmanship. The whole forms a suite of great magnificence, and it was long supposed to have been provided in anticipation of a visit of King James I. to Knole ; but there is now no doubt that it was acquired by gift or purchase upon occasion of the second marriage of the Countess Frances, whose first husband Richard, 5th Earl of Dorset, had died in 1677. A toilet-box from a service of the year 1682 is given as a good specimen of engraving in the Chinese style (No. 88). Other toilet-table sets CHAP. X.] Wine Cisterns and Foitntains. 287 are known of the years 1681, 1682, and 1688 ; the Berners set, and the beautiful service belonging to Sir C. Trevelyan, Bart., being both of them of the latter year. Sir F. A. Milbank, Bart., has No. 89. — FIRE-DOG (CIRCA 1685), AT KNOLE. a set of 1686. Somewhat later ones were exhibited at South Kensington in 1862. One of the finest possible of eighteenth century sets is the property of Sir W. Williams-Wynn, Bart. It is gilt in the very best Louis XV. taste, and of the year 1768. One of the above earlier sets had lain for generations forgotten in the cellars of the Bank of England, where it had once upon a time been deposited for 288 Old English Plate. [chap. X. safe custody, and only came to light on the falling to pieces from age of the case containing it, long after all record of its ownership had been lost. Heraldic or other internal evidence was, however, forth- coming, which enabled the authorities to restore it to the descendants of the original owners. It is very possible that other unknown treasures remain in the same repository. There are several boudoir-tables, either made of or mounted with silver plaques like those at Knole. Amongst them are two at No. 90. — jar (circa 1685), at knole. Windsor Castle. One of these is of the time of Charles II., the other a little later. Silver fire-dogs or andirons also occur of the same period and fashion. Examples of these are preserved both at Windsor and Knole; and reproductions in facsimile of the fire-dogs and the tables in these collections may be seen in the South Kensington Museum. Of the andirons there are no better examples than those at Knole, from one of which the illustration (No. 89) is taken. A pair of fire- dogs of the first year of George I. is known to the author. With these the large jars mentioned at a previous page naturally class themselves. They mark both the most luxurious period of the CHAP. X ] Wine Cisterns and Fountains . 289 seventeenth century and the Chinese taste which prevailed, as we have seen, in the reigns of James II. and of William and Mary. The illustration (No. 90) is also from Knole. WINE CISTERNS AND FOUNTAINS. Not less magnificent than the boudoir furniture that has just been mentioned are the great wine-cisterns that are found of the same period. These cisterns range from 1665 to 1785, but the earlier ones are not accompanied by fountains. The oldest are of gigantic size, and their use may be indicated by the fact that one of the finest of them, now at Welbeck, bearing Harley arms, was made in the year in which the great statesman Robert Harley, who became in turn Speaker, Lord High Treasurer, and Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, came of age. This was in 1682. A still earlier one, of 1667, was amongst the plate of the Cootes, Earls of Mountrath. The later ones are somewhat smaller, and have fountains or great covered urns or vases with taps. It has been conjectured that those which have already been men- tioned in the preface to this chapter, in speaking of ambassadors’ and other official services of plate, were really not used for wine but for washing-up the forks as required on the sideboard. The finest and largest of such pieces is a cistern at the Winter Palace, St. Petersburg, made in 1784 by one Charles Handler, a silversmith in London, from a design by Henry Jernegan. It weighs nearly 8000 ounces, and holds 60 gallons. Perhaps the most immense and one of the most elaborate pieces of decorative plate in the world, it is no doubt the very cistern referred to in the Journals of the House of Commons for 1785 in a somewhat curious connection. In that year a lottery was . authorised by Parliament for raising the funds necessary for building a new bridge over the Thames at Westminster ; and this same Jernegan is found petitioning the House to take as a lottery prize a very magnificent cistern upon which he had expended a vast sum of money and years of work, and which had been pronounced by all to excel anything of the kind that had ever been attempted. He represented, that although he had offered it to various foreign sovereigns through their ambassadors, it remained upon his hands unsold, and in the end Parliament ordered its disposal in the lottery. How it got eventually to the Winter Palace, the author, who himself discovered it there, has not yet been able to ascertain, though an old engraving describes it as “ the property of the Empress of Russia.” u Old English Plate . [CHAP. X, 29 Q No. 91. — WINE-CISTERN (1734), AT THE WINTER PALACE, ST. PETERSBURG. CHAP. X.] Tea and Coffee Services . 291 CASTERS AND CRUET-STANDS. Of these the former first occur at the commencement of the last century, or a few years earlier, and are occasionally found of great size. The larger ones must have been intended as standing-pieces for the decoration of sideboards ; hut it would he difficult to produce legal proof of the genuineness of some of the specimens that have changed hands of late years. The natural tendency of a demand to create a corresponding supply should never he forgotten by the plate- collector any more than by the economist. One of the earliest cruet-stands known is of plain massive silver with five rings and central handle, the rings containing two glass cruets with plain silver caps to slip over the necks by way of stoppers, and three shaped casters of silver with pierced tops for sugar, pepper, &c. — one large, and two to match of smaller size. They are of much the same fashion as the sets of three casters so often seen, of dates ranging from 1720 to 1770, but they are of plainer fashion than more modern examples. This cruet-stand is by Pyne, made in 1706, and is the property of Lord Tredegar. The separate casters above mentioned seem to have formerly formed part of the fittings of cruet-stands. See Appendix A, 1706, 1733, 1734, 1758, 1775. Count A. B. Bobrinsky of Moscow possesses beautiful sets of casters fitting into a great cruet-frame or centre-piece, the work of Paul Lamerie in 1735. TEA AND COFFEE SERVICES, KETTLES, ETC. Tea and coffee must have been well known in England many years before we find silver tea-pots or coffee-pots in common use. A toy tea-pot with tea-cup and tea-spoon of the year 1690 is known. This is also about the date of the first earthenware tea-pots. The earliest tea- pot known to the author in actual domestic use is one of 1709. It has a raised conical lid and a small flap shutter to the spout. This is closely followed by specimens in the possession of the Earl of Ilchester and Earl Amherst. Very few are found for the next twenty years ; but a great number of both tea and coffee-pots, tea-caddies, and kettles were made in the reigns of George I. and George II., at first of very plain design, but afterwards more freely ornamented with chasing and repousse work. The coffee-pot of the reign of George I. was a plain one, tall and tapering, often octagonal, and with a conical octagonal lid to match. Tea-pots are found of very similar fashion as far as regards the lids, but with the round or octagonal body swelling out at the lower part U 2 292 Old English Plate . [chap. x. into a bowl instead of having straight upright sides. Chocolate-pots of the same period are of plain tapering cylindrical form. In the time of George II. and the early days of George III. (No. 92) gadroons and flower-wreaths in the Louis Quinze taste will be looked for ; and later on, oval tea-pots engraved with festoons, knots of riband and medallions, are usually found. No. 92 . — COFFEE-POT ( 1764 ), AT SALTERS 5 HALL, LONDON. The earliest kettles are globular, either quite plain, or with a little engraving; sometimes they are fluted so as to resemble melons or gourds. They are always on openwork stands, with feet; and to these, spirit-lamps, often of a later date, are fitted. There is no better example of the melon-shaped tea-kettle than one in the royal collection at Windsor Castle ; it has been copied for the South Kensington Museum. This stands in a triangular tray, and is of the year 1732. Later in the century urns succeeded to kettles ; many of them are of the pointed oval shape then so popular, and are chased or engraved with festoons and medallions to match the tea-pots of the period. (See No. 93.) CHAP. X.] Tea-Urns . 293 Tea-caddies are not commonly found till the time of George II. ; but all through that reign sets of two tea-caddies and a basin fitted into shagreen cases were very fashionable. Some of them afford good examples of chased flowers and foliage, which are very sharply executed in high relief. Such caddies were usually also supplied with a small spoon with pierced bowl and long pointed handle used for straining the tea and clearing the spout of the tea-pot before the introduction of the fixed strainer at the inner end or insertion of the spout. They are often but erroneously called strawberry-spoons. Of the minor accessories to the tea-table, a few words may be said. A wire basket or strainer was sometimes hung in the spout of the tea- pot, answering the same purpose as the pierced spoon. Of another kind was “the silver strainer, on which, in more economical times than ours, the lady of the house placed the tea- leaves, after the very last drop had been exhausted, that they might afterwards be hospitably divided amongst the company to be eaten 294 Old English Plate . [CHAP. X. with sugar, and with bread and butter.”* About tea-spoons there is nothing to he said that cannot he gathered from the general article on spoons. A very small toy tea-spoon, only two inches long, of the year 1689, and having the usual flat handle of those days, is the oldest tea- spoon of any kind known to the author. Cream-jugs simply follow the fashion of larger vessels ; the earliest being plain and solid like No. 94. — CHOCOLATE-POT (1777), IN THE SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM. tiny helmet ewers, later ones of rococo or of Louis XY. design, and the latest not unlike the chocolate-pot of 1777 given on this page, but with a small square foot. CAKE-BASKETS AND EPERGNES. These are classed together because the former often formed the central or uppermost portion of the latter, and they are of precisely similar style of workmanship. They are objects of considerable * St. Honan’s Well, chap. x. CHAP. X.] Cake-Baskets. 2 95 importance in the plate-collections of the last century, and great taste and skill were expended upon their production. Most of them were made between 1780 and 1780. An early basket of a design peculiar to Paul Lamerie (No. 95), was acquired by the late Mr. J. C. Dent of Sudeley Castle, at the Strawberry Hill sale. The bottom is engraved with the arms of Sir Robert Walpole, encircled with the Garter, hut without a coronet. It will he remembered that Sir Robert enjoyed the rare distinction of the Garter whilst still a No. 95.— CAKE-BASKET (1731), BY PAUL LAMERIE. commoner. This cake-basket is of imitation wicker-work, with handles of the same. A more elaborate example by the same good hand is the property of the Count Bobrinsky at Moscow. It consists of a basin on feet as the centre, with baskets round it which may be removed, and has candle- stick branches, double sets of casters, and cruets, which may he substituted for the baskets or for each other at will. It is of the year 1785. The body of the central howl is chased as wicker-work. To this, which seems to have been a favourite pattern, succeeded the pierced baskets ornamented also with chasing and repousse work, which were very common in the middle of the century. Many of them are of excellent design and finish. One of the finest, in the possession of Mr. W. A. T. Amherst, M.P., is amongst the latest and most 296 Old English Plate . [CHAP. X. remarkable specimens of the work of Paul Lamerie, being of the year 1749. An engraving of this is given (No. 96) ; the chasing of the insects is of the very highest excellence. The piercing of the later baskets is sometimes rather rude ; the holes being merely punched out of the sheet of silver without much additional ornament except some intervening rows of small punched bosses. During the last quarter of the century baskets were not pierced, but No. 96. — CAKE-BASKET (1749), BY PAUL LAMERIE. are solid and either fluted or lobed like escallops, or ornamented with chased bands of foliage. "Where these pierced baskets form the crowning ornament of epergnes, or centre-pieces for table decoration, they are accompanied by a number of smaller baskets of the same design as the large one, all of which could be detached from the branched stand which supported them, and handed with the fruits or sweetmeats they were made to contain. Many examples are noted in Appendix A. CHAP. X.] Maces and Oars . 297 MACES AND OARS. A notice of English plate would be incomplete without a few words about corporation maces and oars. Originally, no doubt, weapons of offence, in modern times maces have become mere symbols of No. 97. — 1IACES AT WINCHCOMBE, CO. GLOUCESTER. authority or emblems of state. Imagination easily carries us back to the days when the escort of some great personage bore simple clubs upon their shoulders with which to clear the way. We may watch the growth of the simple club into an elaborate weapon, and of the 298 Old English Plate . [chap. X. No. 98. — MORPETH GREAT MACE, 1604. elaborate weapon into a work of art, useless for any purpose but adding to the state of legal, civic or academic dignitary. Somehow or other maces seem to have got turned upside-down in the course of these changes ; for the handles of some of the more ancient, as they are now borne, look very like the heads, as they would have been used in case of being required for real work. The City of London with its various wards can show as many as thirty maces, but none of them are as ancient as some of those in the possession of provincial corporations : two of the very oldest being at Hedon in Yorkshire. Somewhat more modern, but still of the sixteenth century, are the small pair (No. 97), which belong to the little town of Winchcombe in Gloucestershire. They are 15 \ inches long. The handles of these are an admirable illustration of what has been said above as to the changing of ends. Very un- comfortable to grasp, they are w r ell fitted to form the striking heads of weapons of offence. A degree more modern, especially as regards the head and plain handle, is the Great Mace of Morpeth (No. 98), for an illustration of which the author is indebted to Mr. R. S. Ferguson.* It is of silver, with bowl and knops gilt, has a cresting of thirty fleurs-de-lis, and on the top the royal arms as borne by the Stuarts. Below the cresting appears the inscription in italic characters, describing it in Latin as the gift of William Howard, Lord of Morpeth, and the Lady Elizabeth, his wife, in 1604. Then under a cable moulding come eight shields with the Howard arms and quarterings ; and below the foot another coat, in Mr. Ferguson’s opinion once undoubtedly enamelled, but from which the coloured matter has completely disappeared. It is 26^ inches in length. The arched crown is not often found before the reign of Charles II. In many cases crowns have * Archaeological Journal , XLII. , p. 90. 300 Old English Plate. [chap. X. No. 101. — OAll-MACE (C. 1690) OF CINQUE PORTS ADMIRALTY COURT. been added to earlier maces, and the crowns are all much alike. The mace of the ward of Cheap (No. 99) is the earliest of the London maces, and is a good example of a mace of the time of Charles I., with a more modern crown. This addition was made in 1678, at the request of the Ward, as one of the inscriptions upon it tells. It will be noticed that the arches spring from a narrow band, which is evidently itself an addition also. The remainder of the bowl with its crest- ing, which has been mutilated to make room for the upper band, together with the shaft, give a good idea of the earlier maces. When the city maces were exhibited at the Society of Antiquaries in 1860, this one was selected for engraving by Mr. Octavius Morgan, because it so admirably illustrated the changes which maces underwent at various times. The bowls are usually ornamented with royal badges that fix their date ; but most of the maces then in existence underwent alteration in this respect in pursuance of an order of Parliament made in 1649, the arms of the Commonwealth being substituted for royal bearings. Mr. A. P. Humphry notes that the cost of this change in the case of the four maces of the University of Cambridge was T9 17s. 3J. The expense of restoring the royal arms on the Yeoman-Bedell’s mace in 1668 is also recorded. Sometimes the heads of maces are made to unscrew 7 from the shaft and to fasten on to short stems with feet so as to form standing cups, the arched crowns also being removable and serving as covers. This is the case with the mace-heads of the towns of Cambridge and Gravesend. A standing cup called the “ Godwin cup,” preserved at Berkeley Castle, is formed of a mace-head of the time of James I. mounted as a drinking cup in the same way. The stems of maces are quite plain in older examples ; but after the Restoration and in the eighteenth century it was the fashion to chase them with a diaper of oak foliage, or rose, or rose and thistle. CHAP. X.] Maces and Oars . 301 As an example of a mace of exceptional form, is given an engraving (No. 100) of the mace of the Tower Ward, London. The tower head is of the reign of Charles II. Eighteenth century maces are very common — Paul Lamerie made a small pair at Hythe in 1744. The grand maces at Eye and Winchelsey are by T. Heihing in 1767. Certain sea-port towns have maces formed as silver oars. There are large and small oars of this description. The larger ones were used as maces and symbolized the Admiralty juris- diction of the town. Specimens are preserved at Southampton, Kochester, Dover, and Yar- mouth, whilst a fine one, formerly at Boston, is now the property of Earl Brownlow. The smaller ones were borne by the water-bailiffs. They are made to contain the oar inside the barrel when not in use, the blade being pulled out, reversed, and screwed into one end of the handle when required to be shown by the water-bailiff as an emblem of authority on occasion of arresting anyone on board ship. Such as these were to be found at Bochester, Colchester, Dover, and Deal, but the last mentioned is now in private hands. As illus- trations are given the large and small oar-maces (Nos. 101 and 102) at Dover. The larger oar is the mace of the Cinque Ports Admiralty Court held from time immemorial in St. James’s Church there, and is of the end of the seventeenth century. The case of the small oar is of brass. Oars are of all periods, from the Elizabethan example at Boston to the small oar of Deal, which is of the year 1819. The silver oar of the Governor of Bermuda is dated 1701, but was made in 1697. That of Great Yarmouth is of 1744 ; whilst the large Bochester oar is of 1748. The small Bochester oar was made in 1728, though it has the year 1721 inscribed upon it. This is perhaps all that can be said about the oar-maces considered as articles of plate ; but those who feel interested in their use and history may be referred to the Arcliceological Journal , Yol. XXX., page 91, and Yol. XXXI., page 82, for some additional particulars relating to them. No. 102. — DOVER water- bailiff’s MACE. 3°2 Old English Plate, [chap. X. RACING AND COCKING BELLS. Two curious cuts of racing and cocking bells have been placed at the author’s disposal by Mr. R. S. Ferguson, to complete the con- cluding section of this sketch of Old English Plate. There are probably not many examples of either to be found. No. 103.— RACING-BELLS (TEMP. ELIZ.), THE PROPERTY OF THE CORPORATION OF CARLISLE. The racing-bells (No. 108), are the property of the Corporation of Carlisle, and it would appear that such a prize was not an uncommon one there. Bells were also given, says Mr. Ferguson, at York, and No. 104. — COCKING-BELL (1655). at Chester. The York bell in 1607 was of gold ; the Chester one, about 1600, of silver only. A reference to these Chester bells will be found amongst the notes about the old goldsmiths of Chester (p. 87) in an earlier chapter. The donor of the larger Carlisle bell was probably Elizabeth, daughter of George Talbot, fourth Earl of Shrewsbury, and wife of CHAP. X.] Conclusion. 303 William Lord Dacre of Gillesland, who was Governor of Carlisle in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It is of silver-gilt, inches in diameter, and bears as shown in the woodcut the rhyming couplet for inscription — 4 - THE + SWEFTES 4~ HORSE 4“ THES 4" BEL -f TO 4~ TAK 4~ FOR 4" MI 4" LADE 4~ DAKER 4" SAKE The smaller bell hears the initials of Henry Baines, Mayor of Carlisle, in 1599. The Cocking-bell of 1655 (No. 104), is a curious relic of the Commonwealth, and may indicate that there was a lighter side to the severity which we are prone to identify with that period in the history of our arts, as well as of our manners. CONCLUSION. The history of plate-working in England has now been surveyed in as much detail as is possible within the compass of a general hand- book. Many of the subjects only touched upon here would require a volume if they were dealt with exhaustively, but enough has been said about each to give the plate-collector an idea of the varying fashions of each successive art period. The antiquary would wish to expand the notices of mazers or salts into chapters ; the artist, to dwell upon the history of shapes and ornament at more suitable length ; the working goldsmith, on the technicalities of the art-workmanship which distinguish many of the most remarkable pieces we have con- sidered. But all will agree that there is a singular interest in English goldsmiths’ work, and it is this : that whilst it has preserved to us in comparatively imperishable materials specimens of the art-workmanship of every decade, from the Gothic period to our own, it has given us at the same time the means of dating these specimens with far greater certainty and accuracy than is the case with any other series of art- objects that have come down to our time. In this way it becomes possible to use old English silver work as a key for the dating of very many and very different objects, which could only be assigned in a general way to their period in art-history, but for the indirect aid that our ancient English system of hall-marking has thus incidentally supplied. In no other way can the gradual melting of Gothic into Renaissance style be so delicately measured, or the sequence of the art-epochs which we are in the habit of calling by the names of the French monarchs of the eighteenth century. The accuracy with which both French and English silver work can be dated enables us to trace the style known generally as ‘ style de Louis XV.’ through three 304 Old English Plate . [chap. x. Separate developments, in a way that would otherwise be almost impossible ; and the same may be said in a greater or less degree of almost every other well-known period from early days to the end of the eighteenth century. This is the point at which it has seemed convenient to break off the various notices which make up the fore- going sketch. The art of the goldsmith in the early days of the present century made less than no progress. Like other seasons of rest, this interval has in our times been followed by a revival which promises much, and especially in our own country ; but it need hardly be said that a Consideration of contemporary work, however interesting in itself, would be inconsistent with the design of a handbook on “ Old English Plate.” APPENDIX A CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OH THE ARTICLES OF PLATE WHICH HAVE SERVED AS AUTHORITY FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE TABLES OE DATE-LETTERS USED AT GOLDSMLTITS’ HALL, LONDON, AND FOR THE MAKERS’ MARKS. In the following list, the years must he understood to begin in the month of May of the year given as the date, and to end in the same month of the year following : — i. j BATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. Alphabet I. 1478 — 1497. 1479 1 Dimidiated fleur-dc- 1 , TC< Chalice and paten. Nettlecombe, Som. 1481 xys. The Anathema Cup, given 1497. Pemb.ColhCamb. 1491 Paten. Stow Longa, Hunts. Apostle-spoon. Rev. Thos. Staniforth. 1493 . . . . 1496 | A pod. with peas in it (?) Paten. Costessey, Norf. Alphabet II. 1498 — 1517. 1498 j Pair of chalices. B.N.C. Oxford. 1499 The Leigh Cup. Mercers’ Company. Do. 1500 Spoon. Alnwick Castle. Spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. 1504 o A barrel or ton Paten. Happisbrough, Norf. 1506 © Bp. Fox’s spoons, with owls at the ends. C.C.C. Oxford. 1507 j . . . . Bp. Fox’s gold chalice and paten. C.C.C. Oxford. 1 x [app. a. 306 Old English Plate . PATH Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1507 i A maidenhead, no shield. Chalice and paten. West Drayton, Midx. 6 6 flQ Do. Do A fish as in 1491 . Mazer. Saffron- Walden Almshouse, Essex. Foundress’ beaker and hour-glass salt. Christ's Coll. Cambridge. 1508 + No shield . Mazer. Whitgift Charity, Croydon, Surrey. 1509 @H! Two links of chain . Paten. Hockham Parva, Norf. 1510 'fiS No shield . Mazer. A. W. Franks, Esq. 1511 . Chalice and paten. Chewton Mendip, Som. 1512 • A barrel or ton as in 1504 . Low bowl used as chalice. Wymeswold, Leic. 1514 1 Man with staff . . Paten. Heworth, Durham. 1515 Do. 1516 Do. ¥ Do. As in 1515 Tazza cup with cover. C.C.C. Oxford. Apostle-spoon (St. Paul), gift of Abp. Parker. C.C.C. Camb. Bp. Fox’s spoons, with balls on the ends. C.C.C. Oxford. Hour-glass salt. Cotehele House, Cornw. 1517 Some small animal . Paten. Rev. T. Staniforth. Alphabet III. 1518—1537. 1518 Do. Do. Do. Two links as in 1509 Chalice. St. Mary’s R. C. Church, Leyland, Lane. Cocoa-nut cup, with hinged straps. Vintners’ Company. Hour-glass salt. Ironmongers’ Company. Do. Saddlers’ Company. 1519 ¥ Set of eleven apostles’ spoons from the Bernal Collection. Rev. T. Staniforth. Do. 1520 1521 Do. Do. Do. 1522 1523 1525 j Crescent and star as in 1516 Two links as in 1509 Do. Paten. Hamsterley, Durh. Standing cup * with imbricated pattern on bowl. Christ’s Coll. Camb. Low bowl with imbricated pattern, and inscrip- tion round in Tudor capitals. J. Dunn Gardner, Esq. Chalice. Jurby, Isle of Man. Paten. Great YValtham, Essex. Mazer, with rose enamelled on boss. C.C.C. Camb. Hour-glass salt. Ironmongers’ Company. Cup, given 1540 by Henry VIII. Barber- Surgeons’ Company. Mount of ivory cup, called Thomas a Becket’s cup. Duke of Norfolk. * The arms on the knop of the cover of this cup have never been identified. They are thus de- scribed by the late Mr. Albert Way Arg. on a clievr. sa. 3 estoiles of the field betw. 3 adders’ heads of the second, a crescent for difference. APP. A.] XVIth Century . 307 Maker’s Mark. 152 1 Do. 152; Do. 1528 Do. 1529 Do. 1530 1531 1532 Do. Do. Do. 1533 Do. 1534 1535 153/ 1539 1543 1545 1546 11548 Do. Do. @3 Do. Do. A heart as in 1515 . A saint’s head . Manasses Stockton was of the “ Keve 5 ‘ in 1569. As in 1528 Fringed S as in 1519 Orb and cross be tween I Casin 1528 No shield. Fringed S as in 1519 John Mabbe was of the “ Cuppe ” in 1569 Do. John Harysson was of the “ Broad Arrow ” in 1569. Fringed S as in 1519 Fringed S as in 1519 Maidenhead Fringed S as in 1519 Covered cnp . . See 1557 Article and Owner. Chalice. Wylye, Wilts. Seal-headed spoon, called the Pudsey spoon. Mayer Museum, Liverpool. Chalice, gift of Sir Thos. Pope. Trin. Coll. Oxford. Spoon. Sir G. Walker, Bart. Spoon, with spirally fluted knob. Rev. T. Stani- forth. The St. Nicholas spoon. J. Dunn Gardner, Esq. Small standing mazer. All Souls’ Coll. Oxford. Apostle-spoon (St. Philip). Dug up at Moreton, near Thornbury, Glouc. Late J. H. Cooke, Esq. ! Apostle-spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. Cover to a cup. C.C.C. Camb. The “ Narford ” mazer. A. W. Franks, Esq. Apostle-spoon (St. Andrew). Dug up at Moreton. Late J. H. Cooke, Esq. Tazza, used as almsplate. Arlington, Devon. Cover to pair of similar tazze (the tazze are of 1530 and 1531). Rochester Cathdl. Paten. St. Edmund, Salisbury. Two-handled cup with cover, .engraved scrolls. C.C.C. Oxford. Mazer, known as the “ Tokerys ” bowl. Rev. T. W. Braikenridge. The “ Boleyn ” cup, used as a chalice. Ciren- cester, Glouc. Apostle-spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. Alphabet IY. 1538—1557. Apostle-spoon (St. Julian). Innholders’ Com- pany. Standing cup, with cover surmounted by statu- ette. St. Peter Mancroft, Norwich. Ewer and salver, engraved with foliated ara- besques, given by Abp. Parker. C.C.C. Camb. Mount of glass jug, cover enamelled with arms of Parr. (From Strawberry Hill Coll.) Sudeley Castle. Apostle-spoon. British Museum. Plain communion cup. St. Lawrence Jewry, London. Mount of glass jug. A. W. Franks, Esq. X 2 308 Old English Plate. [api\ A. DATE 1549 Do. 155.0 1551 Do. Do. 1552 Do. 1553 1554 Do. 1555 Do. 1556 1 557 Do. 1558 1559 1560 Do. 1561 Do. Do. Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. x AC linked letters . Mount of jug. Rev. T. Staniforth. I BN linked letters, probably for Nichs. Bartlemewe. I Leg in armour. One Beereblocke was of the “Legge” in 1569. Seal-headed baluster-top spoon. Frere, Esq. R. Temple A -dexter hand open under a crown. Communion cup, engraved with arabesques Bridekirk, Cumb. Pair of communion cups. St. Margaret, West- minster. Plain communion cup. Hunstanton, Norf. AK linked letters . | Plain communion cup. Totnes, Devon. RD linked letters . Plain communion cup. Messrs. Thomas, 1883. RD linked as in 1552 | TL monogram . . A bird See 1548 . Seal-headed baluster-top spoon. Armourers’ Co. Standing cup with cover, surmounted by statu- ette. Armourers’ Company. Cylindrical standing salt, with cover surmounted by statuette. C.C.C. Oxford. Sir Martin Bowes’ cup. Goldsmiths’ Company. Two-handled cup. C.C.C. Camb. Nautilus cup, with hinged figure straps, foot repousse with masks and flowers. Messrs. Christie, Manson, & Woods. 1885. Alms-dish, with Tudor rose boss. St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. Covered cup on stem, with Eliz. engraved belt. Waterbeach, Cambs. Seal-headed spoon. Messrs. West, Dublin, 1882. Alphabet V. 1558 — 1577. . . . Communion cup and cover. St. Michael-le- j Belfry, York. Mark very indistinct Plain communion cup, gilt, no engraved belt ; egg and dart moulding round foot. St. Peter ad Vincula, Tower of London. Some small horned Spoon, with lion sejant on stem. (Date-letter animal passant. not in a shield.) Sudeley Castle. . Very small communion cup with engraved belt. (Date letter in a regular shield.) Ugglebarnby, I Yorks. Standing cup used as a chalice. Watford, Herts. Apostle-spoon. Innholders’ Company. Sun in splendour, with W in centre, on plain shield. A covered cup as in 1548. Bell-shaped communion cup, paten cover dated 1578, no engraved belt. Lyminge, Kent. APP. A.] XVIth Century . 309 PATE 1561 1562 Do. I Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. I Do. I ; Do. I ! 1563 Maker’s Mark. ♦ Stag’s head,asin 1551 N S interlaced, pro- bably Nichs. Sutton No shield . ? A cricket or grass- hopper below. RD in monogram as in 1553. Do. 1564: Do. Do. 1565 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1566 Do. Do. 1567 Do. Fleur- de- lys as in 1562. A hand grasping a cross-croslet fitche HW As in 1563 IF As in 1557 An animal’s head Some small animal passant, as in 1560 Crescent and three stars as in 1560 . Article and Owner. Communion cup, usual belt. Beeford, Yorks. Mount of stoneware jug. Vintners’ Company. Also com. cup. Swingfield, Kent. Cup and cover surmounted by statuette. Ar- mourers’ Company. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Communion cup, gilt and handsomely engraved in usual style. St. Olave, Old Jewry, Lond. Wide Norfolk-shaped com. cup, engraved belt. St. Lawrence Jewry, Lond. Plain com. cup, no belt. High Halden, Kent. Com. cup, double belt. Headcorn, Kent. Communion cup, usual Elizabethan belt. Aven- ing, Grlouc. Circular standing salt and cover repousse in relief with strap work, cartouches, masks, foliage, &c. ; given 1570, by Abp. Parker. C.C.C. Camb. Standing cup formed as a melon, with melon stalk and tendrils for foot. Hon. Soc. of Inner Temple. Com. cup, usual pattern. Old Alresford, Hants. Com. cup, usual pattern. New Alresford, Hants. Communion cup, usual pattern, but with two belts. All Souls’ Coll. Oxford. Communion cup. Sherburn Hospital, Durh. Communion cup and cover. Little Ness, Salop. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Communion cup and cover, usual Elizabethan belt. Daglingworth, Glouc. Twelve spoons with pear-shaped bowls and angular knops. Mercers’ Company. Small com. cup, usual belt. Hawkinge, Kent. Another. Temple Ewell, Kent. Mount of stoneware jug. Messrs. Garrards. Set of twelve apostles’ spoons, given by Abp. Parker, probably in 1570, as their weight is recorded on the salt of 1562-3, which he gave in that year. C.C.C. Camb. Plain gilt com. cup, no belt. Westerham, Kent. Small com. cup, usual belt, with paten-cover ; formerly at Beding. British Museum. Small communion cup, usual pattern. Oxburgh, Norf. Also paten-cover. E. Horndon, Essex. Old English Plate. 310 [app. i date' Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1567 A hooded falcon. Twelve parcel-gilt plates, engraved after Aide- Thos. Bampton was of “The Falcon” at graver with the Labours of Hercules, formerly the property of the Cotton family. Messrs. this period. Garrards. j Do. m Hand with hammer, Fine parcel-gilt ewer with Bishop Parkhurst’s shaped shield. arms on button of lid. Corpn. of Guildford. Do. RD in monogram, as Jug or pot, with cover and handle. Armourers’ in 1553. Company. Do. . Plain communion cup and cover, no belt. Christ’s Coll. Camb. 1568 A bunch of grapes . Gilt cup and cover, ornamented with chasing. Do. Armourers’ Company. Six engraved plates. Messrs. Thomas. Do. Communion cup. Sutterton, Line. 1569 • * A falcon, as in 1567 . 'Standing salt. Vintners’ Company. Do. Communion cup and cover, usual engraved belt. Poulton, Wilts. Do. . A bull’s head erased Communion cup and cover, usual engraved belt. Do. on shaped stamp. A bunch of grapes, Avening, Glouc. Tall standing cup and cover, surmounted by a statuette ; given in 1569 by Abp. Parker. as in 1568. 1 C.C.C. Camb. Do. Communion cup. Horncastle, Line. Do. IP As in 1566 . . . Com. cup and cover, usual belt. Barlings, Line. Also a very fine one. Eton Coll. Chapel. Also a small one with good belt, dated 1569. Titsey, Surrey. Do. NS Interlaced, as in 1 562 Broken lid, probably from stoneware jug, centre repousse with portrait of Henry VIII. British Museum. 1570 AK Linked letters, as in Communion cups. Sneaton, Yorks., and St. 1551. Bees’, Cumb. Large plain communion cups and covers. Ciren- Do. Stag’s head, as in 1551 cester, Glouc. Do. r m 1 HS interlaced, proba- Communion cup, usual belt. Formerly at Alder- Do. ) bly Henry Sutton. mast on, Berks. Do. Do Do., do., dated 1571. Ingleby Arn cliff e, Yorks. Do. £ SE interlaced . . Tazza cup or bowl on stem, used as chalice. Bas- church, Salop. Do. IP As in 1566 Two-handled cup to match one of 1555, q. v. C.C.C. Camb. Do. I « v* ! ® f Communion, cup. Stow Longa, Hunts. Do. HW As in 1563 Communion cups. Lanchester, Durh., and Pilton, Som. Apostle-spoon. Innholders’ Company. 1571 . Do. A dove on shaped Small gilt t ankard, ornamented with arabesques, ! shield . medallions and masks. Given by Abp. Parker. - in 1571. C.C.C. Camb. Do. BT Linked letters, as in Jug or pot with Elizn. engraving like that of I l 1567. 1567 at Armourers’ Hall. Treasure of the Patriarch, Moscow. APP. A.] XVIth Century. 3 ir DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1571 Do. Do. ; Do. Do. I 1572 1 ; Do- Do. 1 1573 Do. I Do. I Do. 1574 Do. j 1575 Do. ; Do. | Do. | 1576 j Do. Do. Do. Do. IF m HP ED §> Do, Do. Do. Do. 1577 Do. IP 3 ? A TUL wc AK M HI IH Linked letters, as in 1568. Linked letters, as in 1553. An eagle displayed in circular escutcheon As in 1566 . . . This mark occurs on a similar spoon of 1575. As in 1567 . . . A halberd between the letters. As in 1565 Grasshopper below. as in 1562. Linked letters, as in 1551. Crescents and star, as in 1570 As in 1575 . . . ? what . Sun in splendour As in 1571 Compasses with points upwards, a mullet between them. Communion cup. usual pattern. Bothal,Northmb., and Sutton Ashfield, Notts. Communion cup. Greatham, Durh. Com. cup, usual belt. The Chapel, St. Michael’s! Mount, Coraw. Communion cup, usual pattern. Great Smeaton. Yorks. Communion cup. Adlingfleet, Yorks. Gilt tazza in form of a Venetian glass. Christ’s Coll. Camb. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Paten cover, engraved 1572. Northleach, Glouc. Communion cup, parcel gilt, two engraved belts. St. Martin, Exeter. Communion cups and covers, usual pattern. Rodney Stoke and Mark, Som. Seal-headed spoon. ' Armourers’ Company. Blue and gray stoneware jug. Alnwick Castle. Tankard. Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Communion cup and cover, usual belt. Kemble, Wilts. Communion cup and cover, usual belt, parcel gilt. Preston, Glouc. Stoneware jug, with usual repousse mount and lid. Sudeley Castle. Communion cup with paten cover, usual belts, etc. St. Kew, Cornw. Gilt com. cup and cover, dated 1575. Oswestry, Salop. Simon Gibbon’s salt. Goldsmiths’ Company. | Communion cup and cover, dated 1576, two belts. Somerford Keynes, Wilts. Pair of large bowl flagons, dated 1577. Ciren- cester, Glouc. Communion cup and cover, dated 1577, usual pattern, but very handsomely engraved. Fairford, Glouc. Communion cup and cover, dated 1577, usual belt. Baunton, Glouc. Communion cup, usual pattern. Christ Ch. Mourn. Communion cup, dated 1576. Caerleon, Monm. Standing cup with cover surmounted by statuette, 1 now used as a chalice. St. Mabyn, Cornw. Chalice of tazza form. Wishford, Wilts. Communion cup. Magor, Monm. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. [app. a. 3 12 Old English Plate. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. Alphabet VI. 1578—1597. 1578 PG, as shown . . Mount of large mazer-bowl. Armourers’ Company. Do. A windmill, Robt. Small cup, lower part fluted, upper part cn- Pm Wright was of the graved with festoons and animals. St. Mary w “ Wyndmylle ” in 1569. the Virgin, Romney Marsh. Do. IC Animal’s head be- Mount of stoneware flagon. Menheniot, Cornw. tween, as in 1565. Do. . Gilt cup, dated 1578. Drapers’ Company. Do. (§) An escallop . . Apostle-spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. 1579 • Communion cup and paten-cover, dated 1579. Crawley. Suss. 1580 Standing cup with more modern cover. Ar- mourers’ Company. Gilt ewer and salver, partly formed of agate. 1581 Duke of Rutland. Do. t No shield . . . Mount of stoneware flagon. Mailing, Kent. Do. Double - seeded rose Communion cup. . . . co. Rutland. \i§y in pentagon. Do. |KWj Com. cup, Eliz. belt, conical stem, knop under WJ bowl. Grimstone, Leic. 1583 . Large gilt communion cup. Gray’s Inn Chapel, Lond. Do. A flag with staff Pair of large flagons. St. Margaret, Westminster. bendwise. 1581 • . Mount of stoneware jug. A. W. Franks, Esq. Do. .... Gilt cup, shaped as an ostrich egg, hinged straps, foot surmounted by four dolphins. Earl of Ducie. 1585 Do. Gourd-shaped standing cup and cover, stem as /’'Tv double twisted tree-trunk. Armourers’ Comp. Do. ® Very massive seal-headed spoon. Earl of Mount- Edgcumbe. Do. Do. This mark occurs on Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. similar spoons of 1590. 1596, 1602. 1603, 1609, 1611. 1612. Do. Three leaves with 3 Mazer. Rev. H. F. St. John, pellets as in 1576. 158(i This mark occurs on similar spoons of Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. 1596, 1599, 1600, 1601. Do. Small gilt paten. St. Margaret, Westminster. Do. g® A newt on a ton Communion cup with paten cover, usual belts. (rebus for New- ton). Stanford, Kent. Do. (Very large standing salt, flnely repousse with flower-swaggs and masks, cover with scroll supports to a vase, over all three more supports and an acorn knop. Noted by the author. AFP. A.] XVIth Century. 313 DATE I 1588 Do. 1 1589 Do. 1591 Do. Do. 159] 159$. Do. Do. Do. 1593 1591 Do. 1595 Do. Do. 1596 Do. Do. 1597 Do. Maker’s Mark. Do. IG Article and Owner. Cocoa-nut mounts. Cooks’ Company. Plain cylindrical salt, statuette on coyer, ball and bird’s-claw feet. Armourers’ Company. Gilt cup on baluster stem, with knop, engraved with flowers. Eev. T. Staniforth. Flagon, tapering barrel, repousse decorations. Fugglestone St. Peter, Wilts. Rose-water salver with raised boss, engraved with arms, etc. Merchant Taylors’ Company. This mark occurs on I Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. I a similar spoon of! I 1597. I IS interlaced, as in Ostrich-egg cup. Noted by the late Mr. Albert 1588. I Way in 1861, as then in the possession of a family in Kent. Cup on baluster stem, oviform bowl, engr. with foliage. Messrs. Garrards, 1882. An anchor. This mark! Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company, occurs on a similar spoon of 1597. 1 Ostrich- egg cup. C.C.C. Camb. RW As in 1581 A rose below a • • D I As in 1586 . Small rose or a mullet belowv [Newt on ton, as in 1586. ! Linked letters, as in 1591. ! A bear passant below Double-headed eagle displayed. Pair of flagons. Rendcombe, Glouc. Tall cup made of the great seal of Ireland, anno 1593. Marquis of Ely. Small paten. St. Olave, Old Jew r ry, Loud. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Jug-shaped flagon. Westwell, Kent. Ewer and salver. Corporation of Bristol. Salver, repousse strapwork, marine monsters in cartouches, etc. H.M. the Queen. The Hammersley salt. Haberdashers’ Company. Seal-headed spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. Jug-shaped flagon, bowl repousse with strap- work. Treasure of the Patriarch, Moscow. Communion cup. Eokeby, Yorks. Small communion tankard, or flagon, chased and engraved. Christ’s Coll. Camb. Jug-shaped flagon. Westwell, Kent. [app. a. 314 Old English Plate . Do. Do. 1601 Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1598 J w m /E/P' Alphabet VII. 1598—1617. Circular bell-shaped salt with compartments. Octavius Morgan, Esq. Cup with cover, gift of Adam Dixon. Armourers’ Company. Communion cup. East Gilling, Yorks. Beaker-shaped communion cup. Llanfyllin, N. Wales. 1599 (ttY/ j A squirrel Do. I W I . Do. | A- I No shield DO. I flB 1600 j JS Do. Do. A Interlaced W within crescent, as in 1585. Do. Do. Do. IG 1602 • Do. Do. 1603 1604 I IB AB A squirrel, as in 1599 Linked letters, as in 1591. See 1585 . . . Animal’s head erased Harp betw. initials, probably LM, shaped shield. Linked letters, as in 1602. Tall gilt cup, bowl ornamented with large escal lops. Kensington, Midx. Tazza-cup, bowl having ornament punched from 1 the outside. Octavius Morgan, Esq. Small gilt cup on baluster stem. Armourers’ j Company. The Gwalter cup, dated 1599. Innholders’ Co. j Also paten-cover. Throwley, Kent. Large plain gilt bowl. Whitgift Charity, I Croydon. Bell-shaped salt or spice-box. From the Dasent ! collection. Seal-headed spoon. Innholders’ Company. I Pair of great sejant leopards supporting shields. Imperial Treasury, Moscow. Standing cylindrical salt, ex dono Rogers. Goldsmiths’ Company. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Silver gilt cup engr. with flowers ; found in one of the lakes at Knowsley. Earl of Derby. Gourd-shaped cup, stem as twisted tree-trunk. Treasure of the Patriarch, Moscow. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Cup on stem, straight-sided bowl, like the Eliza- bethan communion cups, cover with statuette, ex dono Champernowne. C.C.C. Camb. Communion cup. Ellel, Lane. Plain gilt tankard, straight sides, dome lid with rayed button. Corpn. of Guildford. Cup, dated 1640. Corporation of Hedon, Yorks. Beaker. Mercers’ Company. APP. A. XVIIth Century. DATE 1 Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. Do. Do. 1607 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1608 Do. 1604 r— j This mark occurs on w similar spoons of 1606, 1608, 1610. 1611, 1612, 1613, 1615, 1617, 1619. Do. S3 1620. Do. Animal’s head, as in 1602. Do. IH Bear passant below, as in 1597. 1605 AB Monogram, as in 1602 Do. Do. ® | Do. As in 1585 Do. Do. Do 1606 Do. Do. NR i(wl A head below Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Cup, presented 1588, but must have been re-made this year. The Burgesses of Westminster. Fine jug, snake-handle. Imperial Treasury,! Moscow. Jug-shaped flagons. Romanoff House, Moscow. | A beaker to match that of 1601. Mercers’ Com. Rose-water dish, repousse with marine monsters, j Elizabethan belts and foliage. Clothworkers’ j Company. The Cockayne cups. Skinners’ Company. . Spoon with lion sejant handle. British Museum. Apostle spoon. Melbury House, Dorset. Shallow cup on baluster stem, bowl ornamented with punched pattern from the outside. Ar- mourers’ Company. Cup of similar shape, on bell-shaped stem, with three arms to support bowl, which is orna- j mented with engraving. C.C.C. Camb. Communion cups and patens. Halifax, Yorks. ! Gilt salt in form of a temple. R. Neville Gren- 1 ville, Esq. Circular bell-shaped salt or spice-box. Christ’s Hospital, Lond. Apostle spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. Also spoons ex dono Ferris. Trinity House, Hull. 1 $ Do. (MjJ wc / 'r A ‘ so, This mark occurs on similar spoons of 1609, 1611, 1612 T rising from middle of W. SF interlaced . W within C, as in 1607. Communion cup. North Meols, Lane. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Apostle-spoon. Rev. Thos. Staniforth. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Gilt foot of glass cup. Founders’ Company. Cup, repousse with marine monsters in medal- lions. C.C.C. Camb. Cup, with pyramid on cover. Cutlers’ Company. Paten. Chelmorton, Derby. Apostle spoon. British Museum. Straight-sided tankard-flagons. Brasenose Coll. Chapel, Oxford. io 3i6 Old English Plate. [app. a. Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. A casque ; found on a similar spoon of 1610. As in 1604 . . . Do A cross within a cres- cent, as in 1607. TF in monogram Do. Do. Do. Do Do. fk) 1610 G As in 1605 . . . Do. TF Monogram as in 1600 Do. m\ . . . .| Do. so As in 1608 . . . Do. (ts) ! ‘ 1611 TF Monogram as in 1600 Do. 1612 Do. Do. TF Monogram as in 1609 Do. IV As in 1607 Do. CB Monogram, as in 1606 1613 IV I As in 1607 . . . Do. Do. Do. © Cup and cover, engraved all over bowl with flowers. Armourers’ Company. Tall shaped repousse cup, surmounted by open- work triangular steeple and statuette. Ar- mourers’ Company. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Cup on stem, bowl ornamented with leaves, cover with steeple. C.C.C. Camb. Plain communion cup. Bermondsey, Surrey. Box in form of escallop. Lord Hotham. Apostle spoon. Innholders’ Company. Handsome gilt communion cups and covers. Temple Church, Lond. Ansell’s cup. Carpenters’ Company. Gilt tazza-cup to match one of 1572, q. v. Christ’s Coll. Camb. Communion cup. Halsall, Lane. Also plain deep dish. T. L. B. Baker, Esq. Communion cup, Y-shaped, on baluster stem, formerly at Stanley Pontlarge Church, co. Glouc. Sudeley Castle. Gilt cup and cover. Armourers’ Company. Cup called “ Earl Godwin’s Cup.” Berkeley Castle. Ewer and salver, repousse with marine monsters in oval cartouches, etc., given 1613. Eton College. Communion cups. Prior’s Marston, "YVarw. Reeves’s Cup. Carpenters’ Company. Tall cup, richly repousse, pyramid cover. Barford St. Martin, Wilts. Communion cup, ex clono Ferris. Holy Trinity, Hull. Tall standing cup, cover with finial supported by three mermaids. Trinity House, Lond. Communion cups, covers with knobs. St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. Tall cup with cover surmounted by open-work steeple. Bongate Church, Appleby, West. Plain bowl-shaped flagon (like Cirencester, 1576). St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Thomas Edmonds’ Cup. Carpenters’ Company. Treasury, Moscow. APP. A.] XVIIth Century. 317 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1613 Do. Tall cup with pyramid on cover. Holm Cultram, Cumb. Do. WE As in 1608 . . . Tankard-flagon, repousse ornament. Treasury of the Patriarch, Moscow. Do. (rb) Cylindrical salt with cover, ball and claw feet. Imperial Treasury, Moscow. Do. Do. Another, with triangular pierced pyramid on cover. Romanoff House, Moscow. 1614 IV As in 1607 Plain bowl-shaped flagon, to match that of the preceding year. St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. Do. [Ril Cylindrical standing salt with steeple cover, , dated 1635. Innholders’ Company. Do. IimI IfbJ Tall cup with steeple on cover. Odcombe, Som. Also cup. Kirkburton, Yorks. Do. HU Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. 1615 wc . Three small grace cups on high stems. Christ’s Hospital, London. Do. This mark occurs on similar spoons of 1617, 1621. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Do. (hs) One of three small octagonal cups on high stems. Armourers’ Company. Do. ITr] Do Communion cup and paten-cover, usual Eliza- bethan pattern. Cricklade St. Sampson, Wilts. Do. [q|mJ A key between . . Communion cup on baluster stem. Cumrew, Cumb. 1616 [rb| Rose-water dish, repousse with marine monsters on medallions, etc. Clothworkers’ Company. Do. IV As in 1607 . . . Communion cup with paten cover, dated 1616. St. Andrew, Plymouth. Do. Do. Do Com. cup to match that of 1612. St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. Do. fEL? Flagon. Queen’s Coll., Oxford. Do. w Oviform cup on baluster stem, ex done Johnson, dated 1616. C.C.C. Camb. 1617 Do. Gilt cup, repousse with flowers, etc. on high stem. Armourers’ Company. Do. . . . . Tall hanap with steeple and figure on cover. Bodmin, Cornw. Do. \ # A bell below . . Oviform cup on stem, with scroll bracket sup- ports to bowl. Treasure of the Patriarch, Moscow. Do. SP Interlaced as in 1607 Oviform cup on baluster stem. Chignal, Essex. Do. TP Monogram, as in 1609 Communion cup, usual engraving, given 1618. Sevenoalcs, Kent. Do. flF? Spoons with lion sejant handles. British Museum. Do. IV As in 1607 . . . Ewer and salver. Corporation of Norwich. Do. A dart between Ewer, flat strap-work decoration. H.M. the Queen. Old English Plate. [APP. a. 18 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1618 Alphabet VIII. 1618—1637. Tall repousse tankard. Corporation of Norwich. Do. RC fn plain shield Tall upright gilt communion flagon. Hon. Soc. ! 1619 [All of Gray’s Inn. Tall upright gilt communion flagon, repousse in Do. Crs? A heart below . . panels with straps, etc. Kensington, Midx. A pair of flagons, very like the last, given 1620. Do. CB Monogram, as in Bodmin, Cornw. Tall cup, with steeple and figure with shield and Do. 1606 . A bird alighting with spear on cover. Linton, Kent. Communion plates. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Do. CM wings erect, shaped shield. As in 1615 Communion cup. St. Mary’s, Hulk Do. Communion cup. Ansley, Warw. Do. IS As in 1617 Pilgrim-bottle vase with chains to stopper. Do. TF Monogram , as in 1 609 Imperial Treasury, Moscow. Tall cup with pyramid on cover. Northleach, 1620 Do. Do. . ... Glouc. Plain communion cup, dated 1621. Chelmsford, Do. See 1604 . Essex. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. 1621 See 1615 . . . Do. if' As in 1617 Spoon, with lion sejant on stem. R. T. Frere, Esq. Pair of patens. St. Andrew’s, Plymouth. Do. FW Linked letters, as in 1622 1611. Apostle spoon. Innholders’ Company. Do. s Small cup, given 1648. Corporation of Hull. 1 1623 A trefoil slipped, on Mount of an ostrich-egg cup decorated with Do. HS shaped shield. Blazing star below, as masks in repousse, cover bearing figure of Minerva with spear and flag, dated 1623. H. Willett, Esq. Plain cup, no engraved belt. Sir. T. Thornhill, Do. wc in 1615. As in 1617 . . . Bart. Communion plate, beautifully repousse, gift of 1624 (S€) \V/ . Duchess Dudley in 1627. Ladbroke, Warw. Communion plate. St. Margaret, Westminster. Do. DV Crowned, shaped Mace, dated 1625. Ward of Cheap, Lond. Do. /• o IPvBj shield. Paten or plate. Mark, Som. Do. TF Monogram, as in 1609 Tall plain communion cup with two ribs round Do. [rd] \^/ bowl. Eton Coll. Chapel. Plain ewer. Eton College. Do. $rb? HT Communion cup, esc dono Lady Cutts, 1625. Shipborne, Kent. Plain communion cup and cover. Coin St. 1625 Monogram, as in 1622 Aldwyns, Glouc. APP. A.] XVIIth Century . 319 DATE 1 1626 ! Do. ! Do. I Do. I Do. i 1627 Do. | Do. Do. Do. 1628 Do. | Do. Do. Do. Do. 1629 Do. L | Do. I Do. j ! Do. j Do. 1 |1630 Do. Do. A IT/ %•// HS Maker’s Mark. As in 1615 . CB TF Do. BS TF HS BA BC [CJCj HS BS JdJgJ PB Linked letters PH Some object below Monogram, as in 1606. I Monogram, as in 1609. Do. As in 1619 Monogram, as in 1 1609. As in 1615 A cinquefoil below . As in 1624 A bow and arrow between. A column or tree be- tween the letters. As in 1615 As in 1619 . . . I As in 1624, but heart dotted. Anchor between As in 1624 Article and Owner. Plain communion flagon. Avening, Glouc. Pair of salts like short columns, dated 1626. Innholders’ Company. Gilt basin, like a deep soup-plate. Fishmongers' Company. Yery large plain communion flagons. Christ’s Coll. Camb. Set of thirteen Apostles’ spoons. Goldsmiths' Company. Seal-headed spoon. Armourers’ Company. Tall standing cup given 1626. Trinity House. Pair of large plain gilt patens. Temple Church, London. Communion cup. Berners Rooding, Essex. Apostle-spoon. Innholders’ Company. Seal-headed spoon. R. Temple Frere, Esq. Communion cup, given 1628. St. Andrew, Plymouth. Tall cup, like Edmonds cup, cover surmounted by modern statuette of Britannia. Christ’s Coll., Camb. Cup and paten, given 1628. Spaldwick, Cambs. Small plates with flat rims, dug up in the Castle grounds. Mereworth Castle. Tall cup, gift of Jarman. Carpenters’ Company. Triangular salt. From the Dasent Collection. V-shaped cup, on baluster stem, in which K. Charles I. received the communion on the morning of his death. Welbeck Abbey. Flagon, dated 1628. Totnes, Devon. Small gilt paten. St. Peter ad Vincula, Tower of London. Bowl with handle (see 1628). Mereworth Castle. Flagon. St. Stephen, Bristol. Four gilt communion flagons. Exeter Cathedral. Small paten. St. Mary’s, Beverley, Yorks. Communion cups, dated 1631. Queen’s College, Oxford. Plain cups on baluster stems. Charterhouse, London. 3 2 ° [app. a. Old English Plate. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1630 BS Heart below, as in Pair of communion cups. Charterhouse, Lond. 1619. Do. © Small alms-saucer with two handles. Chalton. Hants. 1631 Small tazza cup, baluster stem, bowl punched with bosses. Armourers’ Company. Do. WM One above another. Alms-plate. St. Stephen’s, Bristol. as in 1630. Do. Mullet above escallop Small frosted cup, gift of Stone. Haberdashers’ between pellets. Company. 1632 Communion cup and paten cover. St. James, Dover. Do. CB Monogram, as in 1 606 Tazza cup, baluster stem, punched bosses, etc. Armourers’ Company. 1633 (WSj Tazza cup, baluster stem, punched bosses, etc. Armourers’ Company. Do. Tazza cup, baluster stem, punched bosses, etc. Vintners’ Company. Do. C within D.asin 1604 Apostle spoon. Innholders’ Company. Do. BC Tall gilt communion flagon, dated 1633. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Do. ‘W Paten. Sandal, Yorks. Also com. cup given 1634. Sevenoaks, Kent. Do. ITPCjf Deep plate engr. with arms, dug up in the grounds. Mereworth Castle. ix\o 1 Do. ws Bow and arrow be- Plain communion cup, gift of B. Hyde. Chid- tween, as in 1629. dingtone, Kent. 1634 Tankards. Corporation of Bristol. Do. [rm| 1 Plain communion flagons. Trinity Coll., Oxfoid. Also flagon. Prior’s Marston, Warw. Do. (m) Seal-headed spoon. Octavius Morgan, Esq. 1635 © An escallop shell Large communion paten and pair of plain flagons, given 1635. St. Olave, Old Jewry, Lond. Do. & , Large plain gilt alms-dish. Lambeth Palace Chapel. Do. [BP] 1 Plain patens. Christ’s Coll., Camb. • Do. r^, Owl standing upon 1 Small communion cup. Llangadwaldr, N. Wales. Do. n small animal. ■ Plain alms-dish, ex dono Bainbrigge. Christ’s Coll., Camb. 1636 Do. Communion cup, without belt. Ampney Crucis, Glouc. Do. Spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. API*. A.] XVIIth Century. 3 2r 1 'DATE | Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1636 © . . . . . • Small trencher-salt, engr. 1636. Erddig, N. Wales. 1637 RB A mullet below, shaped shield. Plain gilt communion cups with paten covers. Hackney, Midx. Do. r5Tl M ullet above escallop Plain gilt flagon, dated 1637. St. Mary at Hill, as in 1631 Lond. Do. Paten. Glaston, Rutland. Do. Communion cup. All Saints’, Maidstone. Do. RM As in 1631 . . . Tall gilt communion flagons. Temple Ch. Loud. Do. (Sgp § • • • Plain communion cup. Holy Trin., Minories, Lond. Do. CC As in 1629 . . . Plain communion cup. St. Peter ad Vincula, Tower of London. Alphabet IX. 1638—1657. 1638 Frosted cup and cover on baluster-stem, given 1638. Trinity House. Do. IP Tall tankard, given 1638. Trinity House. Do. © Monogram, CF Large gilt salt. Mercers’ Company. Do. w Gilt communion cups and a paten, dated 1637. St. Mary, Lambeth. Do. fE5> A buckle beneath, probably for name Buckle. V-shaped cup on balustsr-stem. Vintners’ Co. Do. . Paten. St. Giles, Durham. 1639 TF Monogram, as in 1609 Frosted cup on baluster-stem. Trinity House. Do. RM r~ -i As in 1631 . . . Plain communion flagon to match one of 1637. Temple Church, Lond. Do. . Fluted dish, punched pattern in spirals. Ber- mondsey, Surrey. Do. j^j A pig passant below. Butter-dish. S. E. Shirley, Esq. Do. Seal-headed spoon. R. T. Frere, Esq. Do. Apostle-spoon. British Museum. 1610 ^7 Rose-water dish. Trinity House. Do. Do. Do Another. Charterhouse, Lond, v 3 22 Old English Plate. [APP. a. DATE J\ 1640 IM Do. (dw) Do. m Do. £rk*) \*/ Do. (g) 1641 Do. & 1642 I-I 1643 ^7 1645 <^) 1646 |AF] Do. IfNWlI Do. Do. w 1648 If Do. jwgij 1650 [W] r Owl 11651 SSI Do. HGr Do. RbI \j/ 1652 © Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. IM Pig below as in 1639 Linked letters CT SA linked letters IH linked letters Pair of flagons. St. Ives, Cornw. Flagon, dated 1639. St. Stephen’s, Bristol. Apostles’ spoons. Corporation of Hedon. Sets of communion plate, gift of Lady Frances Kniveton. Bradley, Kniveton, Ormaston, &c. Derbys. Apostle-spoon. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Communion paten. Halsall, Lane. Ewer and basin, ex dono Lister, 1610. Trinity House, Hull. Communion paten. Rev. T. Staniforth. Communion cups dated 1614. Canongaie Ch., Edinburgh. Communion cup, given by Capt. Poyer, the royalist, 1645. St. Mary’s, Pembroke. Standing cup with open-work steeple cover, and statuette of man on horseback. Vintners’ Co. V-shaped communion cup on baluster-stem. Rendcombe, Glouc. Shallow lobed bowl, standing on foot, used as a paten. Marshfield, Monm. Communion cup and paten, ex dono Bedford. Charles Ch., Plymouth. Plain rude communion cup, gift of Robert Jenner, 1648. Marston Meysey, Glouc. Plain communion flagons, frosted sides. St. Stephen, Exeter. Frosted cup, on baluster stem. Mercers’ Co. Communion cup with baluster stem. St. Tudy Cornw. Ewer and salver, ex dono Wandesford, 1652. Hon. Soc. of Lincoln’s Inn. Pint tankard, chased masks, &c. Sir Hedworth Williamson, Bart. Loving cup, gift of Dashwood, 1654. Saddlers’ Company. 12-sided gilt porringer and cover with handles, said to have been given by Oliver Cromwell to Lady Falconberg. In the collection of the late Paul Butler, Esq. APP. A.] XVIIth Century . 3 2 3 DATE 1652 1653 Do. i IetI ! Do. WM Do. 1654; Do. I Do. j 1655 Do. | Do. Do. j Do. I Do. j 1656 Do. Do. Maker’s Mark. @) $ 1657, M Do. Do. Do. | HG Do. 1658 Do. Article and Owner. As in 1648 Hound sejant wc (TTnI Salt, gift of Wrightington, 1653. Trin. House, Hull. Frosted cup on baluster stem, ex done Blood- worth. Vintners’ Company. Small cup with punched ornament. Earl Amherst. Dish deep like soup plate. Lord Harlech. Set of communion and altar plate. Rochester Cathedral. Seal-headed spoon. Rev. X. Staniforth. Frosted loving cup on baluster-stem. Inn- | holders’ Company. . Very small cup like that of 1659 at Marshfield. Sir. T. Thornhill, Bart. . . . . . Plain communion cups and patens. St. Paul, Covent Garden, Lond. .'Pair of alms-dishes. St. Olave, Old Jewry, I j Lond. Apostle-spoon (St. Andrew). Octavius Morgan, I Esq. An oval object below' The Blacksmiths’ Cup. Sir F. A. Milbank, Bart., M.P. . . . . Plain communion cup on baluster-stem. Wyth- I burn, Cumb. Communion cup. Navenby, Line. j . Tall plain communion flagon. St. Mary, Sudeley I Manor, Glouc. Another. Escrick, Yorks. Spoon. Rev. T. Staniforth. Communion cup, given 1656. Thornbury Devon. Seal-headed spoon. Kensington, Midx. Seal-headed spoon. Hackney, Midx. • Plain rude communion cup, ex demo Scotson,' 1657. Bermondsey, Surrey. Plain caudle-cups, ring handles. Clothworkers’ Company. Alphabet X. 1658—1677. Pint tankard. Messrs. Lambert. Small caudle-cup. Trin. House, Hull. As in 1655 Bird with olive branch below. As in 1640 . | Do. . As in 1656 . 324 Old English Plate. [app. a. DATE Maker's Mark. Article and Owner. 1658 [wm] Bowl with cover, repousse with flowers, &c. Viscount Midleton. Do. m Apostle-spoon, dated 1658. Innholders’ Co. Do. Frosted loving cup on baluster-stem, ex dona Osborne, 1658. Innholders’ Company. Note. — This cup and the above spoon both have for date- letter the black-letter capital 3 in the damaged state. 1659 HN Bird with olive branch in beak below, as in 1656. Part of mount to Elizabethan stoneware jug. Rev. T. Staniforth. Do. (m) . Communion cup, bowl ornamented with flat repousse work. Marshfield, Monm. 1660 SV As in 1651 . . . Spoon, plain cut-off end to handle. R. T. Frere, Esq. Do. Animal sejant, as in 1653. Plain communion cups and flagons. Westminster Abbey. Do. • Communion plate. Gloucester Cathedral. Do. • Do Standing cup, repousse, on baluster-stem. Cloth- w T orkers’ Company. Do. Ita! |T*«j . . • Plain communion flagon. Lambeth Palace Chapel. Do. (TO) \M#/ Altar candlesticks and alms-dish. Ch. Ch. Oxford. Do. NW As in 1616 Paten. Skelton, Yorks. Do. Efc ] . . Flagon. Charles Ch., Plymouth. Do. DR As in 1655 Communion cup. St. Teath, Cornw. Do. SV As in 1651 . . . Apostle-spoon. Innholders’ Company. 1661 Do. Do Another. Innholders’ Company. Do. PB As in 1658 Flat tankard. Innholders’ Company. Do. Communion cups and paten covers. St. Mar- garet, Westminster. Do. w . Plain alms-dish. Gloucester Cathedral. Do. Animal sejant, as in 1653. Gilt pricket candlesticks. Gloucester Cathedral. Do. HN As in 1656 Two-handled caudle-cup. Messrs. Lambert, i Small caudle-cup, ring handles. Hon. Soc. of i Lincoln’s Inn. Do. (W) Do. [^1 Flagons, given 1662. Charles Ch., Plymouth. Do. W Loving cup. given 1662. Saddlers’ Company. Do. ET As in 1653 Plain communion cup, baluster-stem. Brigham, Cumb. 1662 [wm| Frosted cup on baluster-stem. Mansion House, j Lond. Do. IW As in 1655 Plain communion flagons. Bermondsey, Surrey. Do. Do. Do. . . Quart tankard, flat lid. In the collection of the 1 late Paul Butler, Esq. Arp. a.] XVI I th Century. 325 DATE 1662 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 166b Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1664 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1665 Do. Do. Do. 1666 1667 Do. Do. Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. EN TA HN as cs HG m Do. FW As in 1661 As in 1660 . As in 1656 As in 1658 . . . As in 1661 As in 1656 . . . A mullet above an escallop between pellets & annulets. Escallop under mul- let, as in 1663. As in 1684. . Patens. Chester Cathedral. Caudle-cup, with cover and handles. Queen’s' Coll., Oxford. Communion cup. Linton, Yorks. Jug-shaped flagons. Chester Cathedral. Small gilt paten. Chester Cathedral. Two-handled porringer. Emmanuel Coll., Camb. Frosted cup on baluster-stem, ex dono Henley, 1664. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Another smaller, ex dono Barker. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Small plain paten. Hackney, Midx. Large paten. Hunstanton, Norf. Paten, dated 1663. Leamington Hastings, Warw. Tall tankards, strap foliage. Imperial Treasury, Moscow. Pair of repousse candlesticks. Imperial Treasury, Moscow. Plain communion flagon, purchased 1664. Also pair of smaller flagons. St. Mary, Lambeth. Plain two-handled drinking-bowl. Armourers’ Company. Flat quart tankard. Lord Tredegar. Jug-shaped communion flagons. Canterbury Cathedral. Large paten on central foot. St. Stephen, Exeter. Hanbury’s cup. Goldsmiths’ Company. Large paten or alms-dish. St. Margaret, West- minster. Communion cup, given 1666. Otford, Kent. Gilt dish, repousse flowers. Erddig, N.Wales. Plain tankard. Fishmongers’ Company. Four plain small trencher salts. Cotehele House, Cornw, Set of three-pronged forks. Cotehele House, Cornw. Plain communion cup and paten. Messrs. Garrards. 326 Old English Plate. [app. a. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1667 TH Anchor between, as Flat-lidded tankard, dated 1666. Cordwainers’ in 1665. Company. 1668 W Gilt salver, dated 1668. St. Paul, Covent Garden, Lond. Do. IrdJ L i*r Rose-water dish. Trinity House. Do. WM Crowned, mullet be- Plain communion flagons. Holy Trinity, low, shaped shield Minories, Lond. Do. IN As in 1662. . . . Wall brackets or sconces, repousse. Sudeley Castle. Do. (p Plain plate, ex dono Raikes, 1668. Trin. House, Hull. 1669 IC As in 1668. . . • Great communion flagon. St. Paul, Covent Garden, Lond. Do. Small cup on low foot, cable pattern round lower edge. Armourers’ Company. Do. m Communion cup, dated 1670. The Dutch Church, Austin Friars, Lond. Do. itm] Porringer and cover, cut-card work. Lord Tredegar. Do. IwhI Cherub’s face below. Cup on high stem, cut-card work. Hon. Soc. of \^J Gray’s Inn. Do. TH Anchor between, as Loving cup, given 1669. Oriel Coll., Oxford. [rl] in 1665. Do. . Paten. Elland, Yorks. Do. Large mace, given 1669. Corporation of Hedon. 1670 . Flat tankard. Trinity House. Do. (w/) Repouss6 cup and cover. Earl Bathurst. w Do. TM As in 1669. ! Rose-water ewer and salver, plain. Hon. Soc. of I Inner Temple. Do. m . ,1 Flat tankard. Armourers’ Company. Do. [iael , Mace. Ward of Billingsgate, Lond. Do. Do. , Porringer with cover, cut-card work ornament, dated 1670. Queen’s Coll., Oxford. Do. RL As in 1669. . . , . Plain alms-plate. Hatherop, Glouc. Do. [rhI ■ . Small tankard, engraved Chinese figures. South Kensington Museum. 1671 Do. . . Lid of the above. South Kensington Museum. Do. Do. . . Plain alms-dish, gift of Katherine Cheney, 1671. Hackney, Midx. Do. Do. . , Plain tumbler cup. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. APP. A.] XVI I th Century. 3 2 7 DATE 1671 Do. I Do. Do. Do. 1672 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1673 Do. Do. 1674 Do. | Do. Do. Do. Maker’s Mark. Do. IC IB Article and Owner. St, l™) ww s % WH As in 1669. . Gilt plates or patens, with feet added later. George’s Chapel, Windsor. Note. — This mark occurs on a ciborium engraved with the arms of Bp. Cosin at Durham Cathedral, date-letter obliterated. Flat tankard. Armourers’ Company. ■ Loving cup. Fishmongers’ Company. . Tankard set with Greek coins and bearing scenes from life of Penn. H.M. the Queen. . . . . Communion cup. Nunnington, Yorks. Crowned, as in 1664.] Loving-cup and cover, repousse scrolls, etc. | Grocers’ Company. Flat-handled forks. Charterhouse, Lond. Plain communion flagon. Ashridge House Chapel. Cherub’s face below, Grace cup on high stem, ornamented with cut- as in 1669. . .] card work. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Tankard, cut-card work. Queen’s Coll., Oxford. BG in cypher, star above. IN As in 1662. Do. 1675] | TL Do. Do. As in 1668 As in 1669 Plain alms-dish. Cirencester, Glouc. The Knole toilet service. Lord Sackville. Alms-plate, dated 1673. Crediton, Devon. Two-handled porringer and ewer, called the “ Cutler ” cup. In the collection of the late Paul Butler, Esq. Flat-stemmed spoon dug up at Brogyntyn. Lord Harlech. Tankard. Christ’s Hospital, London. Plain paten or alms-plate. North Cerney, Glouc. Set of vases and beakers like Chinese porcelain jars. In the collection of the late Marquess of Breadalbane. Flagon, given 1678. Titsey, Surrey. ,| Alms-plate, given 1673. Chiddingstone, Kent. Ewer and plain salver, the gift of the Earl of Anglesey, 1675. Hon. Soc. of Lincoln’s Inn. . . Large paten. Ansley, Warw. . . Plain paten. Bendcombe, Glouc. (This maker’s mark is found on much plate.) Old English Plate . [app. a. 328 ' I DATE 1676 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1677 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1678 Do. 1679 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1680 Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. Do. Plain rude communion cup. Steyning, Sussex. AM [FS] OS Monogram, as in 1672 As in 1675 Ewer and salver, the gift of Sir Joseph William- 1 son, 1676. Cloth workers’ Company. Tankard on lion feet. Lord Harlech. Small flat tankard. Corporation of Oxford. | Flat-lidded tankard. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Cup given by Countess of Burlington, 1677. Keighley, Yorks. <71 CT ilDl Maker, Thos. Ash Octagonal flat hour-glass salt. Saddlers’ Com. . . . . Two-handled caudle-cup. Hon. Soc. of Lincoln’s Inn. (l*R) \kj (t c) Found 1677-88 on Kent church plate. Frosted cup on baluster-stem. Fishmongers’ Company. Plain communion cup, given 1677. Winchcombe, Glouc. IS RM Monogram, as in 1675. Monogram, as in 1676. JG Monogram, re- versed . Ewer and basin, gift of Samuel Pepys, 1677. Clothworkers’ Company. Square salt, with four projecting arms. Cloth- workers’ Company. The “ Pepys ” cup, open-work silver casing over gilt standing-cup. Clothworkers’ Company. Plain silver flagons. Welbeck. [thI . Loving cup with acanthus ornament. Stationers’ Company. IS Monogram, as in 1675 Alphabet XI. 1678—1697, Pair of flagons. St. Nicholas, Bristol. . . . . Tall flagon, given 1679. Skinners’ Company. [bpI L ngr • • • • • 1 Rose-water salver. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. I.R As in 1677 ! Flat tankard, acanthus pattern round lower part of barrel. Trinity House. 1 Flat-handled spoons, dated 1679. Cutlers’ Com- pany. flKl Flat-handled spoons. Cotehele House, Cornw. /®V . Straight-sided porringer, acanthus decoration. T. L. B. Baker, Esq. Probably Ralph Leeke. Rose-water ewer and salver. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Note. — There is plate at Westminster Abbey and other places by this maker, but without date-letter. APP. A.] XVI Ith Century. 3 2 9 !date 1680| Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1681 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1682 Do. Do. Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. As in 1676 Large plain gilt alms-dish. Afl Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Tall loving cup on baluster-stem, given by the Spanish Ambassador who was in England at the time of the plague. New Coll., Oxford. The Knole silver table. Lord Sackville. Monogram, etc., as in 1675. As in 1671 . . . Porringer, 6§ inches high, with two handles and cover, made of solid gold. Corporation of Oxford. Frosted cup, on baluster-stem. Fishmongers’ Company. Pair of ditto, given by John Brett, senr. and junr., 1680. Merchant Taylors’ Company. Alms-dishes. St. Martin, Exeter. • Tall flagons, ex dono Beckford, Clothworkers’ Company. . . Large paten. Guisbro’, Yorks. As in 1680 . . . Immense ice-cistern, exhibited in Loan Collection of 1862. Duke of Rutland. Flat tankard, barrel with acanthus ornament. Fishmongers’ Company. Large paten or alms-plate, given 1682. St. Peter ad Vincula, Tower of London. Pair of small plain communion cups, dated 1681. Minchinhampton, Glouc. Shallow basin ornamented with cut-card work on cover. Earl Bathurst. . Communion flagon, given 1681. Cricklade St. Sampson, Wilts. . Large tankard with acanthus ornament round bottom. Christ’s Coll., Camb. Tall pricket candlesticks, like columns. Exeter Cathedral. Two-handled cup, gift of Rich 1681. Saddlers’ Company. Large paten, given 1681. Whiston, Yorks. Plain paten. Leeds, Kent. A water-bird ; found 1678—93. Frosted cup on baluster-stem. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. . Alms-dish, plain. Cirencester, Glouc. Probably George Garthorne. Plain communion cup, given 1684. Stow-on-the- Wold, Glouc. 330 Old English Plate. |_Arr. a. DATE 1682 Do. ■ I Do. ! Do. 168s! Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1684 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. I Do. 1685 Do. Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. . Communion flagon, given 1683. I Glouc. Ampney Crucis, Frosted loving cup. Innholders’ Company^. Small tankard, repousse strap-work. Trin. Coll., Oxford. BG FS Toilet service, engraved with Chinese subjects. | Messrs. Lambert. Cypher with star Cup and cover, acanthus ornament and fluted, above, as in 1673. j given 1683. Hon. Soc. of the Middle Temple. As in 1676 . . Communion paten, given by President Bathurst. Trin. Coll., Oxford. The “ Berners” toilet set. As in 1677 (EY Damaged let- ters) . Verv small plain communion cup. Kensington. Midx. Cup with handle and spout. Holy Trinity, Minories, Lond. . Plain tankard. Clothworkers’ Company. . Toilet service. Sir Charles Trevelyan, Bart. \VF linked letters . Flagon, dated 1683. St. Mary-le-Port, Bristol. . Gilt tankards repousse with battle-scenes. H. M. the Queen. Found 1677 — 93 . Communion flagons, ornamented all over with repousse work ; also tall pricket candlesticks. Westminster Abbey. . Gilt punch-ladle. Fishmongers’ Company. . Porringer and cover, engraved with Chinese subjects. T. W. C. Master, Esq. . Porringer and cover, ex done Mansell. Jesus j Coll., Oxford. . Square salts, with four projecting arms. Cloth- I workers’ Company. . Communion cup. Chedworth, Glouc. SH linked letters . Large flagon, bought 1685. Kensington, Midx. Do. . Octagonal salt. Mercers’ Company. . Doric-column candlesticks. Merchant Taylors’ Company. APP. A.] XVIIth Century. ' DA TE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1685 ll§) Table-spoons. Mercers’ Company. Do. PK As in 1683 Helmet cup, ornamented with cut-card work, given 1684. Merchant Taylors’ Company. Do. 0) Probably Buteux Pair of salvers on circular central feet, given ! (db) 1684. Merchant Taylors’ Company. Do. & As in 1682 Punch-bowl. Lord Harlech. Do. (Tl) Communion cup and paten. Dumbleton, Glouc. Do. ST In monogram Set of sconces, repousse with arms. Lord Sack- crowned, as in 1681 ville. Do. |y~*~v j P-R Plain flat tankard. Clothworkers’ Company. Do. Bowl repousse and engraved in alternate divi- sions, handles formed of plain flat coiled silver riband (from Valleyfield sale). Rev. T. Stani- forth. mmi Do. w 3 Storks . Pair of jugs, cut-card ornament. Wynnstay. I Do. GG As in 1682 Plain punch-bowl, given 1686. Skinners’ Co. Do. IC As in 1681 . . . Plain tankards, ex dono Sebright. Jesus Coll.,' Oxford. 1686 Do. Do Plain flat tankard. Trinity House. Do. S As in 1664 Two-handled cup, cover and stand. Christ’s Hospital, London. Do. rs®J) Probably Samuel Plain alms-plate. Winchcombe, Glouc. \®y Dell Do. KL As in 1680 Set of dinner-plates, with shaped and gadrooned edge. Earl Bathurst. Do. n&n 1 1 Flat- stemmed, split-ended spoon. Octavius LC [•V*/ Morgan, Esq. Do. DB Buteux, as in 1685 . Pair of candlesticks with baluster-stems. Leeds Castle, Kent. Do. (we) A similar pair. Welbeck. 1687 <§© Probably Nat. G reen e Alms-dish, given 1688. Avening, Glouc. Do. EG As in 1682 . . Plain half-pint tumbler. All Souls’ Coll. Oxf. 1688 1 1 cl Flat-stemmed, rat-tailed table-spoons. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Do. (;:} Linked as in 1684 . Plain paten on central foot. St. Mary Arches, Exeter. Do. © Probably Fras. Gar- thorne. Paten, dated 1689. St. Mary-le-Bow, Durham, j Do. [F-i] Probably John Jack- Two handled-cup, Chinese engraving. Coach-! makers’ Company. \sf son. 1689 p As in 1684 Large repousse paten, given 1690. Uffington, Line. 33 2 Old English Plate. [app. a. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1689 FG As in 1688 . . . Plain-gilt casters. H. M. the Queen. Do. Probably Peeter Circular stand with gadrooned foot. Sir F. Mil- Harache. bank, Bart. Do. m Probably Ant. Nelme Toilet-mirror frame, Chinese style. Leeds Castle, l Kent. 1690 J As in 1682 . . . Caudle-cup, called a “ plate ” at Queen’s. Queen’s Coll., Oxford. Do. g&L. CWB) Large Doric-column candlesticks. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Do. IxSyl Communion flagons, dated 1690. Preston, Glouc. Do. P As in 1684 Alms-dish, dated 1690. Kensington, Midlx. Do. R. Timbrell . . . Plain flat tankard, dated 1690. Clothworkers’ Company. 1691 Salver, gadrooned edge, centre chased with “ The Last Supper.” St. Margaret, Westminster. Do. FS As in 1676 . Plain half-pint tumbler. All Souls’ Coll., Ox- ford. Do. IY As in 1685 Another. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Do. Probably R. Timbrell Frosted cup, baluster-stem. Fishmongers’ Com- pany. Do. D Large flagon, dated 1691. St. Mary Arches, Exeter. Do. (Mg) 1 Loving cups, acanthus decoration, dated 1692. Stationers’ Company. 1692 IY As in 1685 Flagons, dated 1692. St. Petrock, Exeter. Do. Do. Do Flagons, dated 1692. St. Martin, Exeter. Do. P As in 1684 Plain gilt toilet service, gadrooned edges. Earl of Breadalbane. Do. GG As in 1682 . . . Jug-flagon with scroll-handle and cut-card orna- ment. Kensington Palace Chapel. 1693 RL As in 1680 Communion plate given by “ Sarah, latedutchess of Somerset,” 1694. St. Margaret, West- minster. Do. •RT* As in 1691 . . . Plain jug-shaped communion flagon. Foulden, Norf. Do. [me] . Small rudely shaped communion cup, dated 1694. Poole Keynes, Wilts. Do. RC As in 1684 . . . Small communion cups with covers, given 1694. St. James’, Westminster. Do. Fish above Cup with paten-cover. Old Romney, Kent. Do. Water bird, as in 1682. Tall flagon, dated 1694. Weston Subedge, Glouc. Do. Probably Wm. Keatt. Flagons. Holy Trinity, Hull. 1694 i<&t\ Probably John Frosted cups, baluster stems, gift of the Bank of IR Ruslen. England. Mercers’ Company. Apr. a.] XVI Ith Century. 333 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1694 II As in 1688 Communion cup, dated 1694, Llangedwyn, N. Wales. Do. Probably Robert Communion cup and paten cover, very plain and viz Cooper. rude. Didlington, Norf. Do. /•Vfv (TAJ Probably Thomas Alms-plates, dated 1695. Halifax, Yorks. \«iy Allen. Do. TI Escallops, as in 1685. Ewer, gadrooned. Lord Sackville. Do. Tankard, flat lid. Magd. Coll., Oxford. Do. Oblong box inkstand, acanthus ornament. Col. Warde, Squerries, Kent. Do. fa As in 1688. . . . Credence paten with royal arms. Trin. Ch., New York, U. S. A. 1695 ii As in 1688 Pair of communion flagons, given 1695. St. Margaret, Westminster. Do. I'C As in 1691 . . . Large paten or alms-plate on central foot, gadrooned edge. St. Winnoe, Cornw. 1696 (1st & As in 1682 Monteith, ex dono Abney. Fishmongers’ Com. ! pt.) Do. [rwI Paten on central foot, gadrooned edge, given l i$r 1698. Byfield, Northants. Do. [tbI Thos. Brydon . Jug-shaped flagon, dated 1696. St. Mary, Beverley, Yorks. Do. Spoon. St. Nicholas, Bristol. Do. iwi Plain communion cup, dated 1696. Boughton Monchelsey, Kent. Do. M Probably Andrew Moore. Pair of fire-dogs. H. M. the Queen. Alphabet XII. 1696, Part 2 — 1715. 1696 (2nd pt.) • Communion flagon. St. Bride, Chester. 1697 (El Wm. Denny and Tall communion cup, on baluster-stem, with paten-cover. Kensington, Midx, (OB) (AT John Bathe. Do. 3 Straining-spoon. Westminster Abbey. Do. Hugh Roberts in Communion cup with gadrooned knop and foot ; Do. Newgate Street . also a paten. Byfield, Northants. • • • • • • Pair of large communion flagons, dated 1697. $±y) Chelmsford, Essex. Do. Bli Cfc) Joseph Bird . . Candlesticks, baluster-stems. Welbeck. Do. G£y) JCH 5 James Chadwick Dinner-plates. Lord St. Oswald. 334 Old English Plate. [app. a. j DATE 1 Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1697 Do. 1698 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1699 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1700 Do. E DB A William Gibson Richard Hutchinson of Colchester. John Ruslen at y e Golden Cup in Swithin Lane. Beni. Watts, ent. 1698. Denny and Bathe, as in 1697. Robert Peake, ent. 1697. William Fawdery Dinner-plates. Lord St. Oswald. Large flagons, dated 1697. Chelmsford, Essex. Monteith, punch-ladle and salver. Fishmongers’ Company. Rat-tailed spoon. W. R. M. Wynne. Esq., Peniarth. Also flagon, dated 1699. Haxey, Lines. Plain gilt alms-plate engraved with Mann arms. Large paten on foot. Melbury, Dorset. Tall flagons, given 1698. New Romney, Kent. Another. Leamington Hastings, Warw. [SI 5 ] Robert Timbrell . . Pair of fine Monteiths. Mercers’ Company. Four small patens. St. Margaret, Westminster. Flat taper candlestick. Earl Bathurst. Fluted porringer. R. T. Frere, Esq. Benj. Traherne Simon Pantin, ent 1701. Joseph Stokes, ent. 1697. Francis Singleton Samuell Hood 1697. John Chartier, ent. 1698. William Lukin, ent, 1699. Samuel Dell, ent. 1697. William Gamble, ent. 1697. Peeter Harracke, jun., ent. 1698 . , Anthony Nelme . Large plain salver, gift of Lord Chancellor Somers, as Recorder of the City. Corporation of Gloucester. Monteith. Rev. T. Staniforth. Monteith, gilt, noted by the author. Communion plate. Ch. Ch. Oxford. Preserving saucepan. T. L. B. Baker, Esq. Large alms-dish. Holy Trinity, Coventry. Paten. Great Ouseburn, Yorks. Very large salver. Earl Bathurst. Note.— S ome of the splendid plate made for the great Duke of Marlborough, and exhibited in the Loan Collection of 1SG2 by Earl Spencer, was by this maker. Fine large Monteith, dated 1700, Merchant Taylors’ Company. APP. A.] XVIIIth Century. 335 DATE Maker’s Mark. Do. Do. John Cory . . . George Boothby, at the sign of the Parrot. John Bodington George Lewis, ent. 1699. Benjamin Pyne . . Joseph Ward, ent. 1697. John Fawdery (A smaller than the F). Pierre Platel, ent. 1699. Robert Cooper, ent, 1697. Article and Owner. John Sutton . William Andre wes . John Ladyman . . Do Philip Rollos . . John Smith . . . Seth Lofthouse . . Peeter Harracke, as in 1700. Do John Eastt, ent. 1697. John Martin Stocker and Edwd. Pea- cock, ent. 1705. Paten. Auborn, Line. Helmet ewer. Eton College. Plain communion flagon. North Cerney, Glouc. J Plain communion cup, goblet shape, and cover. Cricklade St. Sampson, Wilts. Circular salvers, on round central feet. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Plain communion cup and cover. Sapperton, Glouc. Plain communion cup and cover. Duntisbourne Rous, Glouc. Monteith. Vintners’ Company. Helmet-cup with strap- work ornament, and two- handled cups. Messrs. Garrards, 1878. Large paten, dated 1703. Weston Subedge, Glouc. Paten. Long Marston, Yorks. Tankard. South Kensington Museum. Also much Kent church plate 1697-1707. Table-spoon. W. Cripps, Esq. Spoon, flat stem, cut end. Rev. T. Staniforth. Fire-dogs. Welbeck. Communion cup. Driffield, Glouc. Plain half -pint tumbler. All Souls’ Coll., Ox- ford. Helmet-shaped ewer. Vintners’ Company. Large two-handled cup and cover. Berkeley Castle. A small racing cup of gold. Thorp-Perrow. Communion plate. Newton, Norfolk. Large paten, ex (lono Pendarves. St. Ives. Cornwall. Old English Plate . [app. a. 336 Ti PY &) | DATE I 1706 ; Do. ; Ido. I DO. [ 1 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1707 Do. 1708 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1709 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. mt] 1710! PY Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. PA <^H> v/ FA WI CO <$> no PA R. Timbrell, as in Large flat-lidded tankard. Vintners’ Company. 1699. David Willaume in Helmet-cup with mermaid-handle and a salver. the Pell Mell. , Edward York, ent. : 1705. B. Pyne, as in 1701 . J. Barbut, ent. 1703 J ohn Gibbons, ent. 1700. John Downes, ent. 1697. Andrew Raven . Simon Pantin, as in 1699. Alice Sheene, ent. 1700. Wm. Fawdery, as in 1698. John Wisdome, ent. j 1704. Edward York, as in 1706. David Willaume, as in 1706. Robert Cooper, as in 1702. Goyce I s s 0 d widdow.” j Thomas Allen in Gutter Lane. Samuel Hood, as in I 1699. Simon Pantin, as in 1699. Gabriel Sleath, ent. 1706. Humphrey Payne, ent. 1701, Francis Garthorne, ent. 1697, John Read, ent. 1704. B. Pyne, as in 1701. Fishmongers’ Company. Pair of patens on circular central feet. Gray’s Inn Chapel. Cruet-stand. Lord Tredegar. Rat-tailed spoons. Hon. Soc. of Inner Temple. Paten. Springthorpe, Line. Paten. Pauli, Yorks. Paten, dated 1706. St. Mary Bishophill, senior, York. Very large two-handled cup and cover. Earl Bathurst. Plain paten or alms-plate. Ched worth, Glouc. Punch-ladle. lion. Soc. of Middle Temple. Small plain chocolate pot. Lord Hotham. Paten on foot. Kemble, Wilts. Large round salver on foot. Earl Bathurst. Communion cup and patens, given 1708. Lincoln’s Inn Chapel. Two-handled fluted porringer, used as a chalice. Uley, Glouc. Rat-tailed table-spoons. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Pair of salvers, gadrooned edge. Mercers’ Co. Globular box, perhaps for soap. Lord Hotham. Another. Lord Hotham. Note.— These boxes are like the object above the initials in Sleath’s mark. Large plain communion flagon, dated 1709. Winchcombe, Glouc. Communion plate, gift of Q. Anne. Trinity Ch., New York, U.S.A. Communion cup. Wrexham, N. Wales. Gilt two-handled drinking cup and cover. St. Margaret, Westminster. APP. A.] XVIIIth Century. 337 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1710 PY B. Pyne, as in 1701 Gold two-handled cup and cover. Noted by the author. Do. Richard Greene, ent. Paten or alms-plate on foot. Oxburgh, Norf. J 1703. Do. 2L0 Seth Lofthouse, as in Paten. Bradford, Yorks. 1705. Do. <— r-s Philip Rollos, junior. Small chocolate pot. Lord Sackville. [IBJ ent. 1705. Do. Another mark of Large monteith, lion handles, &c. The Winter Gabriel Sleath. Palace, St. Petersburg. 1711 Do. Do Paten and flagon. Sapperton, Glouc. Do. GA A within the G. as ii, Communion plate, gift of Q. Anne. St. Peter’s, 1709. Francis Gar- Albany, N. Y. thorne. Do. (Lo) <$> Nath. Lock, ent.1698. Plain alms-plate Bermondsey Church, Surrey. Do. EA John Eastt, as in Paten. Buxton, Norf. 1705. Do. r^i Edmund Pearce, ent. 1704. Two-handled cup and cover. Lord Harlech. 1712 @ ' Matth. E. Lofthouse. Fine half-gallon tankard. All Souls’ Coll., ent. 1705. Oxford. Do. CgD William Twell, ent. 1709. Candlesticks with octagonal bases. Noted by the author. 1713 © Probably Edward Vincent. Helmet-ewer. Trin. Coll., Oxford. Do. JLu William Lukin, as in A fine monteith. Mansion House, Lond. 1699. Do. (ft) One of the Pantin Shaped salvers. Hatfield House. family. 1714 Matth. E. Lofthouse, Plain communion cup. Coates, Glouc. as in 1712. Do. Do Large repouss6 and chased salad bowl. W. Cripps, Esq. Do. John Bathe, ent. 1700. Plain dinner plates. Viscount Falmouth. 1715 PY B. Pyne, as in 1701. Hand candlestick. Ravensworth Castle. Do. BO John Bodington, as Plain hexagonal chocolate pot. W. Cripps, Esq. in 1701. Do. PY B. Pyne, as in 1701. Helmet-ewer and salver. Berkeley Castle. Do. Isaac Liger in Hem- ing’s Row, ent. Three-pronged {able forks. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. 1704. Do. Pa H. Payne, as in 1709 Paten. Llangedwyn, N. Wales. Do. Ct&j Wm. Fleming, ent. Small oval tray, edge lobed outwards. W. A. T. 1697. Amherst, Esq. Do. EA John Eastt, as in Plain communion cup and cover. Foulden, 1705. Norfolk. Do. (§) Robert Timbrell Communion flagon. Belton, Line, Z 338 Old English Plate, [app. a. ^ DATE Maker’s Mark. _ 1 Article and Owner. 1715 © William Spackman, ent. 1714. Paten. Dent, Yorks. Do. as Petley Ley, ent. 1715 Paten. Borden, Kent, Do. Vhx? Samuel Hitchcock, Rat-tailed table-spoons. Lord St, Oswald. w ent. 1712. Alphabet XIII.— 1716 to 1735. 1716 SL Gabriel Sleath, as in Flagon dated 1716. given by the widow of Sir 1710. Robert Atkyns. Coates, Glouc. Do. Pa H. Payne, as in 1709 Loving cups on baluster stems, monteiths, salvers, etc. Salters’ Company. Do. 81 Henry Jay . . . Alms-plates, dated 1718. Hunton, Kent. Do. CCL) Niccolaus Clausen, Massive ink -tray. Wclbeck. (jig) ent. 1709. Do. fife Samuell Lea, ent. Tankard. T. L. B. Baker, Esq. 1711. 1717 WI John Wisdome, as in Communion flagon. Kemble, Wilts. Do. 1708. Paul Lamerie, ent. Gold two-handled cup and cover. Berkeley lip 1712. Castle. Do. M. E. Lofthouse, as Plain paten or alms- plate on central foot. in 1712. Foulden, Norf. Do. PrXl David Tanqueray . Circular salver on central foot. Narford Hall, ent, 1713. Norf. Do. m Richard Bayley, ent. 1708. Taper candlestick. Rt. Hon. Sir J. R. Mow- bray, Bart. 1718 13 Edward Holaday in Immense upright flagons given by the Corpora- Grafton St., ent. 1709. tion of Mines Royal, etc., 1718. Mercers’ Co. Do. FA W.Fawderyasin 1698 Monteith, given 1718. Hon. Soc. of Lincoln’s Inn. Do. TA Tanqueray, as in 1 7 1 7 Coffee-cup saucers, with frames to hold the cups. Narford Hall, Norf. Do. SL G. Sleath, as in 1709. Monteith, bull’s-head handles. Clothworkers’ Co. Do. Jonah Clifton, ent. Paten. Green Hammerton, Yorks. m 1703. 1719 Anthony Nelme, as Dinner plates, shaped and gadrooned edge. in 1700. I Lord Hotham. Do. (y§ John White, ent. 1719 Low open dishes, fluted. T. W, C. Master, Esq. Do. CL Nicolas Clausen, as Shaped dinner plates. Yiscount Midleton. in 1716. Do. Thomas Mason, ent. 1716. Plates, given 1720. Westerham, Kent. Do. Louis Cuny, ent. Salver. Col. Warde, Squerries, Kent. 1 1703. Arp. a.] XVII Ith Century. 339 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1719 w Samnel Margas, ent. 1714. Candlesticks. Col. Warde, Squerries, Kent. 1720 LA P.Lamerie,asin 1717 Large two-handled cup and cover, chased. Lord Do. Hotham. PY B. Pyne, as in 1701 . Very large shaped ewer with lid and handle. Mansion House, Lond. Do. © John Eckfourd, in Large two-handled cup and cover. NarfordHall, Bed Lion Court. Norfolk. Also cup dated 1719. Doncaster, Drury Lane. Yorks. Do. [fefijj John Edwards , Flagons, dated 1720. Scarboro’, Yorks. 1721 PY B. Pyne, as in 1701 . Three pairs of ewers and salvers, Brit. st. Do. Mansion House, Lond. (j*b) John Bignell, o. s., Plain communion cup and cover. Holy Trinitv, ent. 1720. Minories, Lond. Do. R. Greene, as in 1710 Tankard, Brit. st. Hamon le Strange, Esq. Do. ($ Joseph Clare, old sterling mark, ent. Pint mug. Messrs. Lambert. 1720. Do. &L Aug. Courtauld, ent. Square salver, Brit. st. Messrs. Lambert. go) 1708. Do. (ev) Probably Edw. Vin- Communion cups, dated 1722. Orton, Westmor. \oy cent. 1722 Bowles Nash, ent. 1721. Alms-dish, given 1723. St. Margaret, Westminster Do. Nathaniell Gulliver, ent. 1722. Paten, dated 1722. Howden, Yorks. 1723 Abraham Buteux, Oblong salver given by Lady Trollope, 1724. CAB) ent. 1721. Uffington, Line. \ic) Do. dlb Win. Paradise, ent. 1718. Small paten, Brit. st. Poole Keynes, Wilts. Do. Thos. Ffarrer in Punch-bowl. Lord Harlech. (t-f) Swithing Lane, ent. 1720. Do. John East, ent. 1721 Large tankard. Armourers’ Company. 1724 LI Isaac Liger, as ini 71 5. Low bowl, lobed edge, Brit. st. Narford Hall, Norf. Do. Wh John White, as in Communion plate. St. German’s, Cornw. 1719. Do. MeshachGodwin, ent. Small communion cup, dated 1724. St. Thomas, [mg] 1722. Cliffe, Lewes. Do. Jap M. Arnett and E. Communion cup. Barmston, Yorks. ^E) i£r Pococke, ent. 1720. Do. fWi Jas. Smith, ent. 1720 Communion plate. Owston, Yorks. z 2 340 Old English Plate. [app. a. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1725 Humphrey Payne, old Plain beer- jug. Sudeley Castle. sterling mark. ent. 1720. Do. • • • • Small plain paten, cover to an older cup, both ^ ^ given 1725. Folkestone, Kent. Do. George Wickes, ent. Paten. Holy Trin., Coventry. 1721. Do. Paul Hanet, ent. 1721 Dessert forks. Lord Sackville. Do. John Edwards, ent. Square salver. Rt. Hon. Sir M. E. Hicks-Beach, fftiil 1724. Bart. Do. David Willaume,ent. Dinner plates. Viscount Falmouth. 1720. 1726 Edward Wood, ent. Repouss6 sugar-basin. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. 1722. Do. (KC) . Paten. Portslade, Sussex. Do. LA P. Lamerie, as in Square salver on feet. Messrs. Hunt & Roskell. 1717. Do. WA William Atkinson . Alms-dish. Burstwick, Yorks. 1727 /^\ John Tuite . . . Shaped snuffer-tray on feet. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Do. ( m ) Paul Crespin, old Four-pronged table-forks. Narford Hall, Norf. fpcj standard mark, 1720. 1728 EW Edward Wood, as iu Small oblong salts. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. 1726. Do. Do. Do Small oblong salts. Rev. T. Staniforth. Do. © James Gould, ent. Table-candlesticks. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. 1722. Do. @> Edw. Cornock, ent. 1723. Salver, given 1729. Chart Sutton, Kent. 1729 CR Paul Crespin, NS 1720 Epergne, chased, etc., bearing the royal arms, (scallop and mullet as in 1727). Brit. st. Lord Hotham. Do. & Aug. Courtauld, ent. Two-handled cup, cover and salver to match. 1729. Trinity House, Lond. Do. LA P. Lamerie, as in Four small square waiters, Brit. st. W. A. T. 1717. Amherst, Esq. Do. & Francis Nelme, old Dinner plates, shaped and gadrooned edge. standard mark, ent. 1722. Earl Bathurst. Do. Humphrey Payne, as in 1725. Plain communion cup. Middle, Salop. Do. pEPl Lion rampant above. Small teapot. Rev. T. Staniforth. Edward Pocock, ent. 1728. 1730 i'cdty] Jeremiah King, ent. Pair of two-handled cups with covers. Hon. ll*KJ ! . . 1723. Soc. of Middle Temple. APP. A.] XVIIIth Century. 34i DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1730 LA P. Lamerie, as in Chocolate pot, Brit. st. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. 1717. Do. T-F Thos. Ffarrer, as in Pair of alms-plates. Holy Trin., Minories, Lond. 1723. Do. AB Abraham Buteux, as Two-handled cup and cover, ornamented with in 1723. raised belts. Sir W. Williams Wynn. Bart. Do. fry\ George Wickes, as in Set of four gilt maces, arched crown heads. 1725. Corporation of Exeter. Do. E-B Richard Bayley, NS Flagon and alms-dish. Halsall, Lane. 1720. Plain oblong Do. Gabriel Sleath, ent. Covers to pair of older cups. Merchant Taylors’ 1720. Company. Do. |dw! David Willaume, ent. Set of table candlesticks, square bases with 1728. corners cut off. Lord Sackville. Do. William Lukin, ent. 1725. Small salver. Rt. Hon. Sir J. It. Mowbray, Bart. 1731 LA Paul Lamerie, as in Set of four small circular salts, with masks above 1717. the feet, and wreaths between, Brit. st-, Lord Hotham. Do. Do. Do Open-work cake-basket, imitation of wicker- work, Brit. st. Sudeley Castle. Do. srsr John Tuite, as in Set of tea-caddies in shagreen case. W. R. M. 1727. Wynne, Esq. Do. Wm. Darker, ent. Communion flagon. Sandal, Yorks. |WJ)1 1731. Do. Do. Do Sauce-pan. Lord Harlech. Do. IK Jeremiah King, as Tankards (one made of British silver). Mansion in 1730. House, Lond. Do. Joseph Smith, ent. Tankard on lion-feet. Ironmongers’ Company. 1728. 1732 PC Paul Crespin, as in Dinner plates, shaped and gadrooned edges. 1727. Lord Hotham. Do. EP Edward Pocock, as in Small square waiters, corners shaped. All Souls’ 1729. Coll., Oxford. Do. di George Hindmarsh, ent. 1731. Salvers. Rt. Hon. Sir M. E. Hicks-Beach, Bart. Do. (ill) Caleb Hill, ent. 1728 Table forks. T. L. B. Baker, Esq. 1733 @ 3 ) Paul Lamerie, 2nd Large two-handled cup and cover, chased with Do. mark, ent; 1732, “ old sterling mark” strap-work ornaments. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Do. Do Large oblong salver. Sir T. Thornhill, Bart. Do. # John Gamon, ent. 1726-7. Small pepper-caster. Clothworkers’ Company. 1734 Samuel Wood . Sugar-casters, plain shape. Clothworkers’ Com- Do. Aug. Courtauld, as in pany. AC Melon-shaped kettle, with lamp and stand. W. Do. 1729. A. T. Amherst, Esq. [WrG] William Gould, ent. Taper candlesticks. Clothworkers’ Company. ^cr 1732. Do. f®! Charles Handler Immense wine cistern. The Winter Palace, St. iKAj Petersburg. 342 Old English Plate. [APP. A. DATE Maker’s Mark. 1735 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Article and Owner. [j^i m as 111 ] Do. PL Do. |H^ Do. fffwl 1736 © Do. RA Do. [Hi ISfJ. Do. Jin f IS 1 1737 PL Do. <©> \ •* / Do. ItT Do. IS Do. yy 1738 j I"bs1 Do. M Do. (t$y) 1*1 ITT 1 Robert Abercromby, ent. 1731. Humphrey Payne, as in 1725. ! Richard Gurney & Co., old sterling | mark, ent. 1734. Gabriel Sleath, as in 1730. | Peter Archambo . . Do j Geo. Hindmarsh, ent. 1735. ! Paul Lamerie, as in I 1733. John E ckf ord , j unior , ent. 1725. George Wickes, ent. 1735. Robert Brown, ent. 1736. Robert Abercromby, as in 1735. Joseph Allen, ent. 1729. John Le Sage, ent. 1722. Paul Lamerie, as in 1733. ! Louis Dupont, ent. 1736. I Isaac Callard, old sterling, ent. 1726. Joseph Smith, as in | 1731. John Tuite, as in 1727. Benj. Sanders, ent. 1737. Joseph Sanders, ent. 1730. Thos. Tearle, old sterling, ent. 1720. Waiter on feet, shaped edge. Prof. A. H. Church. Waiter. J. Vaughan, Esq., Nannau. Pair of candlesticks. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Note. — This mark was first entered in 1727 by Thomas Cooke and Richard Gurney, living at y e Golden Cup in Foster Lane. Plain two-handled cups. Clothworkers’ Com- pany. Pierced cake-basket. T. W. C. Master, Esq. Pierced cake-basket. Lord Harlech. Fine-shaped salver, given 1735. Clothworkers’ Company. Centre-piece with branches for small baskets, candlesticks, casters, cruets, &c., all inter- changeable, with beautifully chased upper basket. Count Bobrinsky, Moscow. Plain flagon. Minchinhampton, Glouc. The first mark entered as of the house now occupied by the Messrs. Garrard. Alphabet XIV— 1736 to 1755. Plain tankard. Vintners’ Compan}^. Chased salver on feet. T. W. C. Master, Esq. Alms-plate. Kensington Palace Chapel. Tall sugar-casters. Viscount Falmouth. Dinner plates and dishes to match. Mansion House, Lond. Two-handled cup and cover. Lord Tredegar. Three-pronged table forks. W. A. T. Amherst. Esq. Pint tankard. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Waiter. Lord Harlech. Kettle and stand to form epergne, with candle- branches and sweetmeat trays to fit on. Octavius Morgan, Esq. Mark found on portions of the above. Tea-pot repousse with flowers. Octavius Mor- gan, Esq. Also much Kent church-plate, 1725—37. APP. A.] XVIIItk Century. 343 Maker’s Mark. Do. W7C Do. fa*] Isaac Callard, as in 1737. Fras. Spilsbury, ent. 1729. Benj. Godfrey, ent. 1732. Thos. Bush, ent. 1724 P. Lamerie, 3rd mark, ent. 1739. Do Jeremiah King, ent 1739. George Wickes, King’s Arms, Pan- ton JSt., ent. 1739. William Garrard, ent. 1739. Thos. Tearle, ent. 1739. Augustin Courtauld, ent, 1739. Gurney & Co., ent. 1739. P. Lamerie, as in 1739. William Hunter, ent. 1739. Gabriel Sleatli, ent, 1739. Thos. Farren, ent. 1739. Fras. Spilsbury, ent, 1739. Lewis Pantin, ent. 1739. P. Lamerie, as in 1739. D. Willaume, ent, 1739. Allen, ent. 1739 Edward Feline, ent. 1739. Article and Owner. Three-pronged table forks. Lord Tredegar. Flagon, dated 1738. Tideswell, Derbyshire. Broth-basin, with cover, tray, and spoon. Viscount Midleton. Flagon, given 1738. St. Mary’s, Sandwich, Kent. Two-handled cup and cover, handsomely chased. Lord Tredegar. Another. Goldsmiths’ Company. Rat-tailed dessert-spoon. Lord Tredegar. First entry of the name of Garrard, which at length in 1792 becomes associated with that of Wakelin, the successor of Wickes in I’anton St, Flagon. Holy Trim, Micklegate, York. Paten, cx dono Bathurst. Siddington, Glouc. Communion flagon, giveii 1741, Steyning, Sussex. Two-handled cup and cover, chased strap orna- ments. Clothworkers’ Company. Pierced and chased cake-basket. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Two-handled cup with cover, and salver to match. Mansion House, Lond. Tankards. Charterhouse, Lond. Small tea-pot. Sir W. Williams Wynn, Bart. Kettle with lamp and stand. Noted by the author. Plain saucepan. Messrs. Lambert. Ewer. Goldsmiths’ Company. Dinner plates. Viscount Falmouth. Communion plate, gift of K. Geo. II. Trim Ch., Boston, New England. Coffee-pot, Sir W. Williams Wynn, Bart. 344 Old English Plate. [AFP. A. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1742 Jeconiah Ashley, ent. Large inkstand. Sir W. Williams Wynn, Bart. 1740. Do. Elizabeth Godfrey . A paten or alms-plate. St. Minver, Cornw. Do. Chas. Hatfield, ent. Globe-shaped kettle, lamp and stand. T. W. C. 1739. Master, Esq. Do. @> Samuel Wells, ent. 1740. Small salver or alms-plate. St. Margaret, West- minster. Do. r^n John Neville and Spoons and three-pronged forks. E. R. Wing- AC Ann Craig, ent. 1740. field, Esq. Do. r Si mm Wm. Gould, ent. 1739 Table candlesticks. T. W. C. Master, Esq. 1743 J.3ClUg As in 1739 Dessert-spoon. W. Cripps, Esq. Do. Benj. West, ent. 1739 Baptismal bowl. St. Clement’s, Sandwich, Kent. 1744 0 s ! P. Lamerie, as in 1739. Plain mug with handle. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Do. Do. Do Oblong tea-caddies, masks at corners, panels chased with Chinese subjects. Quentin Hogg, Esq. Do. Edward Feline, as in Pierced and chased cake-basket. Octavius Mor- Dc? 1742. gan, Esq. Do. John Robinson, ent. Large salvers on feet, shaped edges. W. A. T. 1739. Amherst, Esq. Do. Peter Archambo, ent. 1739. Candlesticks. Rt. Hon. Sir J. R. Mowbray, Bart. 1745 & Gurney & Co., as in Two-handled cup and cover. Lord Harlech. 1740. 6 Do. Peze Pilleau, ent. Coffee-pot. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. @£) 1739. 1746 Do. Do Kettle, lamp, and stand. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Do. &J Paul Lamerie, as in Three plain mugs with handles. W. A. T. Am- 1739. herst, Esq. Do. Hugh Mills, ent. Small salver, shaped edge. Hon. Soc. of Middle (JCMe 1745. Temple. Large tankards and also butter-boats. Hon. Do. & 0t'§ 6 Gurney & Co., as in 1740. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Do. Eben. Coker, ent. Three-pronged forks. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. 1739. Do. EG Elizabeth Godfrey, as Pierced and chased cake-basket. Lord Tredegar. in 1742. APP. A.] X Vlllth Century. 345 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1746 William Peaston, ent. 1745-6. Salver. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Do. (^1 Thos. Gilpin, ent. Salver. Rev. G. F. E. Shaw. ggy 1739. 1747 William Grundy, ent. Two-handled cup and cover, chased, given 1747. 1743. Fishmongers’ Company. Do. XJl Hugh Mills, as in 1746. Salver. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Do. Edw. Wakelin, ent. (See 1739.) [fecttl 1747. Do. William Cripps, ent. 1743. Pierced cake-basket. Col. Warde, Squerries, Kent. Do. <$£) Thos. Heming, ent. 1745 Jug with cover. Melbury House, Dorset. 1748 Gabriel Sleath, as in 1740. Plain communion cup, given 1748. Dursley, Glouc. Do. ($ 2 ) Samuel Taylor, ent. Tea-caddies in shagreen case. W. Edkins, Esq. 1744. Do. Ayme Yedeau, ent. Oval salver, shaped and chased edge. Fish- (M2) 1739. mongers’ Company. 1749 P. Lamerie, as in Cake-basket, circular salver, also coffee-pot. W. 1739. A. 4'. Amherst, Esq. Do. Fuller White, ent. 1744. Communion flagon, given 1749. Chapel- Aller ton, Yorks. Do. <$> John Pollock, ent. 1739. Sauce-boat. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Do. Fredk. Handler, ent. Kettle, with lamp and stand. E. R. Wingfield, 1739. Esq. 1750 WP William Peaston, as Large lobed rose-water bowl. Trin. Coll., in 1746. Oxford. Do. n John Rowe, ent. 1749. Two-handled cup. Clothworkers’ Company. Do. Humphrey Payne, Flagon, dated 1750. Havenby, Line. \ir ent. 1739. Do. Benj. Gignac, ent. Small trays, formerly part of epergne. T. L. B. [BVGl 1744. Baker, Esq. 1751 (eg) Elias Cachart, ent. Table spoons. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. 1748. 1752 Ml Sam. Courtauld, ent. Set of table candlesticks. Harford Hall, Norf. ®© 1746. Do. AtL Gurney & Co., ent. Plain two-handled cup. Rev. G. F. E. Shaw. (r.g) \cr 1750. 1753 , Communion flagon, dated 1754. Llangedwyn, N. Wales. Do. P w Fuller White, as in Communion flagon. Hunmanby, Yorks. 1749. 346 Old English Plate. [app. a. DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1753 James Shruder, ent. Oblong box and other pieces of various dates. 1739. Melbury House, Dorset. Do. ffrQl John Quantock . . Candlesticks. Do. 1754 (dp) Dan. Piers, ent. 1746. Large butter-boats with handles and feet, gadrooned edges. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Do. i Si John Cafe, ent. 1742 Table candlesticks. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Do. Phillips Garden, ent. 1751. Pair of large jugs. Rt. Hon. Sir M. E. Hicks- Beach, Bart. 1755 (zffi John Pajne, ent. Plain coffee-pot. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. 1751. Alphabet XV. — 1756 to 1775. 1756 Samuel Taylor, as in Pair of tea-caddies in shagreen case, chased and repousse with flowers, spiral flutes, etc. In 1748. the collection of the late Paul Butler, Esq. Do. © Paul Crespin, ent. 1739. Massive circular salts. Welbeck. Do. @ John Swift, ent. 1739. Half-pint tumbler cups. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Do. FW Fuller White, as in Quart tankard. Lord Tredegar. 1749. Do. Wm. Grundy, as in Gilt patens, gadrooned edge, on central feet. Do. 1747. Canterbury Cathedral. Do. Do Cheese-toaster, ex dono Charles Morgan. Queen’s Coll., Oxford. 1757 DP Dan. Piers, as in Set of candlesticks, also meat-dishes. Lord 1754. Hotham. Do. iTL Edw. Aldridge and Pierced basket. Rt. Hon. Sir J. R. Mowbray, (SA) J ohn Stamper, ent. Bart. 1753. Do. \ w / Pierre Gillois, ent. Tea-caddies. Idsworth, Hants. 1754. 1758 MP Set of three casters, one larger and a pair smaller. Lord Hotham. Do. fwc| Parish mace. St. Margaret, Westminster. Do. Do. Wm. Plummer, ent. Pierced cake -basket. Lord Tredegar. Cake-basket pierced and having spiral flutes. Do. [Wfj 1755. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Do. Thos. Whipham, and Communion flagons and alms-basin. St. Paul, Chas. Wright, ent. Exeter. 1757. Do. Sf-& John Payne, as in 1755. Small tumbler cups. Octavius Morgan, Esq. 1759 (f) Parker and Wakelin, Inkstand. Soane Museum, London. goldsmiths to the |ew| Prince of Wales. Do. [RRl Robert Rew, ent. 1754 Large salver. Noted by the author. APP. A.] XVIIIth Century. 347 Maker’s Mark. 1759 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1760 Do. 1761 Do. 1762 Do. 1763 1764 Do. Do. C T-W W foV 3 3 \* [CMJ c TW W I*M Whipham & Wright, as in 1758. Wm. Cafe, ent. 1757. John Langford and John Sebille. John Swift, as in 1756. Wm. Shaw and Wm. Priest, ent. 1749. Abraham Portal, ent. 1749. Richard Rngg, ent. 1754, smaller size letters than Robert Rew of same year. Whipham & Wright as in 1758. Jacob Marshe, ent. 1744. Fuller White, ent 1758. Do. wNvC Do. IP Parker and Wakelin, Do. EW as in 1759. William Shaw, ent. <@) 1749. : Do. 33 John Swift, as in 1756. Do. iAtA, Lewis Herne and Frangois Butty, ent. 1757. Do. nu Do. w-p Probably W. and R. R-P Peaston. Septimus and James Crespell. Samuel Herbert and Co., ent. 1750. David and Robert Hennell, ent. 1763. Article and Owner. Helmet-cup, merman handle, ornamented with strapwork. Fishmongers’ Company. Candlesticks. Earl of Durham. Inkstand. Noted by the author. Large tankard. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Quart tankard. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Tripod pricket altar candlesticks, ornamented with wreaths, cherubs, etc. Trin. Coll., Oxford. Two-handled cup and cover. Sir W. N. Throck- morton, Bart. Hand candlesticks. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Small wired basket with entwined wreaths. Earl Ducie. Spiral fluted tea-urn on square open-work foot. Salters’ Company. Pint tankard. W. Cripps, Esq. Communion flagon. Dursley, Glouc. Pierced cake-basket. Trin. Coll., Oxford. Gravy spoons. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Two-handled racing cups and covers, vase-shaped and chased. Duke of Cleveland. Communion flagon, usual pattern, given 1763. Byfield, Northants. Inkstand, gilt, Louis XV. style. Sir W. Williams Wynn, Bart. Shaped dishes in sets. Earl Amherst. Epergne with pierced baskets, etc. The Schloss, Berlin. Tankards. Gift of K. George III. and Q. Charlotte. Eton College. Large oblong inkstand with lids. Viscount Midleton. Cake-basket. Sir H. Pelly, Bart. Large salt-cellar. Sir W. Williams Wynn, Bart. 348 Old English Plate. [app. a. Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. Do. Do. 1765 3-S> Probably Ebenezer Coker. William Bond and John Phipps, ent. 1754. Wm. Grundy, as in 1747. Louis Black, ent. 1761. William and James Priest. Daniel Smith and Kobert Sharp. Small waiter used as paten. Ickburgh, ITorf. Shaped coffee-pot, repoussd with scrolls and foliage. Salters’ Company. Heads of parish beadles’ staves, bought 1765. St. Paul, Covent Garden, London. Table candlesticks, Corinthian caps. Sir Geo. Chetwode, Bart. Coffee-pot repousse. T. L. B. Baker, Esq. Salver. Welbeck. . . Cake-basket. Sir H. Pelly, Bart. John Swift, as in 1756. Do As in 1765 Frangois Butty and Nich. Dumee, ent. 1759. Do Peter Werritzer, ent. 1750. Thos. Hannam and John Crouch. Quart tankard. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Pint tankards. All Souls’ Coll., Oxford. Tea-caddies. Sudeley Castle. Communion plate. Durham Cathedral. Alms-plate, dated 1766. St. German’s, Cornw. Candlesticks, Corinthian capitals. Sudeley Castle, Paten. Newchurch, Bomney Marsh. Plain kettle, lamp, and stand. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. . Quart tankard. Lord Tredegar. Butty and Dumee, as Chased and fluted pricket altar-candlesticks. in 1766. Durham Cathedral. Thos. Homing . J Large maces, dated 1767, engr. T. HEMING | fecit. Corpn. of Rye. S. and J. Crespell, as| Butter-boats, gadrooned edge, handles at each end. Salters’ Company. Communion plate. Croft, Yorks. in 1764. Whipham & Wright, as in 1758. HR 1769 Do. Do. Probably John! Salvers, gadrooned edges. T. W. C. Master, Esq. Carter. Richard Rugg, as in Salver. Sir W. Williams Wynn. Bart. 1760. Do Shaped and gadrooned salvers. Earl Amherst. As in 1763. . . Epergne, with hanging baskets and larger basket, T. W. C. Master, Esq. John Hyatt and Chas. Table candlesticks. T. W. C. Master, Esq. Semore, ent. 1757. APP. A.] XVIIIth Century. 349 Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1769 Do. 1770 Do. Do. 1771 Do. Do. Do. 1772 Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. Do. 1773 Do. Do. Do. 1774 Do. Do. Do. Do. IH SC IC m WP TP EC IP EW EH 9fl IB IP EW WP ML sc IC Iwvl W5 BC isy 0*1 Joseph Heriot, ent. 1750. Fras. Crump, ent. 1756. Thos. Homing, as in 1767. S. and J. Crespell, as in 1764. See 1768. W. Plummer, as in 1758. As in 1763. See 1764. Philip Norman Thos. and Jabez Daniel. Parker and Wakelin, as in 1759. Probably Emick Ro- mer. Thos. Heming, as in 1767. Probably C. Wright. Jonathan Alleine Probably J ohn Barry ent. 1758. Parker and Wakelin as in 1759. W. Plummer, as in 1758. S. and J. Crespell, as in 1764. William Vincent Crouch and Hannam, see 1766. George Smith, ent 1774. Sumner and Crossley, ent. 1773. James Young and Orlando Jackson, ent. 1774. Oblong box, chasing by Moser, presented with freedom of London to K. Christian VII. of Denmark. Rosenberg Museum, Copenhagen. Communion cup, dated 1770. Sawley, Yorks. Soup tureen and cover. Hon. Soc. of Middle Temple. Set of dinner plates. Earl Bathurst. Waiters with shaped and gadrooned edges. Earl Ducie. Pierced and repouss6 cake-baskets. Earl Ducie. Epergne, with pierced hanging baskets. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Candlesticks like Corinthian columns. Merchant Taylors’ Company. Goblet-shaped communion cup and paten, Exeter Cathedral. Muffineer. Prof. A. H. Church. Large circular salver, shaped and gadrooned edge. Earl Amherst. Epergne with pierced work and flower-sprays. Rt. Hon. Sir J. R. Mowbray, Bart. Chocolate pot. Hatfield House. Large two-handled cup and cover, with dragon handles, fluted stem, wreaths, cover sur- mounted by statuette. Mansion House, Lond. Set of candlesticks with gadrooned ornament on feet. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Snuffers. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Sauce-boats. Lord Hotham. Pierced and repousse cake-basket. W. Edkins, Esq. Plain tumbler, with belt round middle, fitted into a stand. Berkeley Castle. Set of dinner plates. Lord Harlech. Open-work (vine pattern) sugar-basket. W. Cripps, Esq. Salver. Earl Ducie. Three-pronged forks. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. Spoonmakers’ mark. Two-handled oval vase with leaf straps. E. H. Luxmoore, Esq. 350 DATE 1775 Do. Do. Do. Do. 1776 Do. Do. Do. 1777 Do. Do. Do. 1778 1779 Do. 1780 Do. 1781 Do. Do. 1782 Do. Do. Old English Plate . o [app. a. i-c (TD) Mi Makep.’s Mark. See 1768 . T. Daniell, ent. Robert Piercy, 1775. James Young, 1775. Article and Owner. * Set of candlesticks ornamented with rams’ heads, etc. From the Hopkinson collection. E.Waller, Esq. 1774. Pierced and repousse cake-basket. Sudeley 1 Castle. • • ' Wine-strainer, beaded edge. Hon. Soc. of Gray’s Inn. ent. Sugar-casters. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. ent. Sugar vase, urn-shaped, with handles as ropes. Rt. Hon. Sir J. R. Mowbray, Bart. HI IS ED ws H CA a cw Alphabet XVI. — 1776 to 1795. Robt. Jones and John Scofield, ent. 1776. Chas. Aldridge and Henry Green, ent. 1775. Set of salvers. Sir H. Pelly, Bart. Claret jugs, festoons and medallions for orna- ment. Also a salver, with beaded edge. Clothworkers’ Company. Burrage Davenport . Open-work cake-basket. Earl Amherst. Andrew Fogclberg . As in 1775 . . . Chas. Aldridge and Henry Green, as in 1775. As in 1772 . . . Dinner plates. Rt. Hon. Sir M. E. Hicks-Beach, Bart. Small communion cup. Gloucester Cathedral. Inkstand. Rev. C. Orlando Kenyon. Communion plate. Coin St. Aldwyns, Glouc. Daniel Smith and Robert Sharp. Toilet set, with medallions, wreaths, etc. National Museum, Stockholm. T. Heming, 1767. as in Salvers. Rt. Hon. Sir M. E. Hicks-Beach, Bart. Also 1777, candlesticks. Melbury House. B. Davenport, as in 1776. Thos. Northcote, ent. 1776. John Wakelin and Wm. Tayler, 1776- 92. John Scofield, ent. 1778. Probably J ohn Barry. as in 1772. Edward Fennell, ent. 1780. Daniel Smith and Robert Sharp, ent. 1780. Do Do Hester Bateman, ent. 1774. Large bread-basket, shaped as a shell. Noted by the author. Feather-edged spoons. Earl of Glasgow. Plain kettle, lamp and stand. Sold at Christie and Manson’s, 1876. Candlesticks. Sudeley Castle. (This maker pro- duced a great number of candlesticks and much other plate.) Snuffers. W. A. T. Amherst, Esq. Flagon, dated 1786. Lympne, Kent. Pair of large tankards. Trin. Coll., Oxford. Chased salver. Trinit}' House. Flat tankard. All Souls’ College, Oxford. Small two-handled tray. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Arp. a.] XVIIIth Century. 35 1 DATE Maker’s Mark. Article and Owner. 1783 US Edward Jay, ent. Flat-candlestick. W. E. Oakley, Esq. Plas 1757. Tanybwlch. 1784 8 & George Smith, as in Gravy spoons, feather-edged. (No King’s head 1774. mark). W. Cripps, Esq. (This maker made many spoons.) Do. © Samuel Wintle, ent. Very small tea-spoons. (King’s head mark in intaglio.) W. Cripps, Esq. 1783. 1785 TD T. Daniell. as in Oviform communion cup. Old Shoreham, Suss. 1775. Do. RdT Richd. Crossley, ent. Spoons. Lord Tredegar. (This maker made — 1782. many spoons.) Do. Hester Bateman, as in 1782. Paten, dated 1785. Gateshead, Durh. Do. dP John Lambe, ent. Large tankard, ex (lono Dillcc. Trin. Coll., 1783. Oxford. Do. IS John Scofield, as in Candlesticks. Earl Bathurst. 1780. Do. 8 & George Smith, as in 1784. Set of dessert-spoons, feather- edged. W. Cripps, Esq. Note. — All the above specimens of this year have the King’s head in intaglio. 1786 G-S George Smith and This mark is found on a large number of spoons wr W illiam Fearn ,ent. 1786. from this year till about 1792. Do. IS John Scofield, as in Oval-pointed tea-urn, pointed handles. Late 1780. Miss Ker- Porter. Do. I*H John Harris, ent. Bread-basket. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. 1786. . 1787 |HG 1 Henry Green, ent. 1786. Barge-master’s badge. Clothworkers’ Company. 1788 1 ) Hen. Chawner, 1786- Oval-pointed, boat-shaped salts, with handles at 96. each end. E. Waller, Esq. Do. I c Crouch and Hannam, Salver. Sudeley Castle. TH as in 1774. 1789 Do. Do Oval salver, with handles. W. A. T. Amherst. Do. Esq. Hester Bateman, as in 1782. Small plain communion cup. St. Paul, Covent Garden, Lond. 1790 / WP Win. Pitts and Joseph Small stand, with festoons and medallions. vPP, Preedy, ent. 1791. Earl Ducie. Do. wv Wm. Vincent, as in Oval waiter or teapot stand. Late Miss Ker- 1774. Porter. 1791 1 © Robert Hennell, ent. Plain circular sugar-basin, on square foot, two / 1773. pointed handles of the period. Berkeley Castle. Do. |wa| Wm. Abdy, ent. 1784. Oval- pointed, boat-shaped salt-cellars. W. Cripps. Esq. Do. HG Henry Green, as in Oval waiter or tea-pot stand. Ravensworth 1787. Castle. Do. PB Peter and Ann Bate- Oval-pointed, boat-shaped sugar-basin.W. Cripps, AB man, ent. 1791, Esq. Do. HC Henry Chawner, as Ewer. Sir H. Pelly, Bart. in 1788. 352 Old English Plate. [app. a. Do. Do. 1798 Do. Do. Do. 1799 Do. 1800 Do 1802 1804 DATE 1792 HC Do. m Do. IS Do. 1 Do. m Do. G S TH 1793 @) 1794 WP IP 1795 Do. Do. IS Do. IT 1796 IS 1797 Do. Maker’s Mark. WA RH DH RC WE WF PB Afc WB RH DH SH Article and Owner. Henry Chawner, as, in 1788. John King, ent. 1785. John Scofield, as in 1780. Paul Storr, ent. 1792- 3. Robert Sharp, ent. 1789. George Smith and Thos. Hayter, ent. 1792. John Moore, ent. 1778. Pitts and Preedy, as in 1790. Do John Scofield, as in 1780. John Thompson of Sunderland, ent. 1785. John Scofield, as in 1780. Do Wm. Abdy, as in 1791. Robert and David Henell, ent. 1795. Richard Crossley, as in 1785. John Ernes, 1796- 1808. J. Wakelin and Robt. Garrard, 1792-1802 John Robins, ent. 1774. Wm. Ealeyand Wm. Fearn, ent. 1797. Peter, Ann, and Wm. Bateman, ent. 1800, Messrs. Henell . Henry Nutting, ent 1796. Fluted baptismal basin. St. Margaret, Westm. Plain communion cup. Bagendon, Glouc. Fluted oval tea-pot (Rundell and Bridge). Lord Tredegar. Oval-pointed cup with cover and handles. Lord Sackville. Large and also smaller candlesticks on square bases. Salters’ Company. This mark is found on many spoons. Small plain paten, given 1793. Marston Meysey. Wilts. Epergne and plateau. Mercers’ Company. Inkstand. Trinity House. Yery fine Wedgwood-shaped, two-handled vases and covers. Merchant Taylors’ Company. Coffee-pot. Lord Harlech. Alphabet XYII. — 1796 to 1804. Oval tea-pot and stand (bought of Rundell and Bridge). W. Cripps, Esq. Tea-pot stand. W. R. M. Wynne, Esq. Oval solid cake-basket. H. Bertie Williams Wynn, Esq. Large shaped and gadrooned dish for fish. Rev. T. Staniforth. Table-spoons. Royal North Gloucester Militia. Table-spoons. Royal North Gloucester Militia. Fish-slice. Royal North Gloucester Militia. Oval-pointed soup-tureen with handles. Lord Tredegar. Communion plate. South Cerney, Glouc. Soup-ladle. Royal North Gloucester Militia. Table-forks. W. Cripps, Esq. Pair of small beaker-cups. Sudeley Castle. Tea-pot, raised rim, and coffee jug or pot to match. Noted by the author. Tea-pot, raised rim. Welbeck. APPENDIX B. IMPROVED TABLES OF THE DATE-LETTEBS USED BY ALL THE ENGLISH, SCOTCH, AND IRISH ASSAY-HALLS, FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES. Note. — It must be observed that the following tables of marks should be consulted by the light of the chapters that relate to them ; and it is thought better to refer the reader to those chapters, and especially to the tabular sheet appended to each, than to encumber the tables now to be given with a number of minute notes. For example, the tables give the marks as they are found on silver plate, and on gold plate until quite recently ; but the marks now used to distinguish gold plate may be seen at a glance in the tabular sheets given at the end of Chap. II. for London plate, and at the end of Chaps. V., VI., and VII., for Provincial, Scotch, and Irish gold wares respectively. A A CHARACTERS OF THE ALPHABETS OF DATE-LETTERS USED BY GOLDSMITHS’ COMPANY OP LONDON. I. 1478 to 1498. — Lombardic, double cusps. II. 1498 to 1518. — Black letter, small. III. 1518 to 1538. — Lombardic. IY. 1538 to 1558. — Roman letter, and other capitals. Y. 1558 to 1578. — Black letter, small. VI. 1578 to 1598. — Roman letter, capitals. VII. 1598 to 1618. — Lombardic, external cusps. VIII. 1618 to 1638. — Italic letter, small. IX. 1638 to 1658.— Court hand. X. 1658 to 1678. — Black letter, capitals. XI. 1678 to 1696.— Ditto, small. XII. 1696 to 1716.— Court hand. XIII. 1716 to 1736. — Roman letter, capitals. XIV. 1736 to 1756.— Ditto, small. XV. 1756 to 1776. — Old English or black letter, capitals. XVI. 1776 to 1796.— Roman letter, small. XVII. 1796 to 1816. — Ditto, capitals. XVIII. 1816 to 1836.— Ditto, small. XIX. 1836 to 1856.— Old English or black letter, capitals. XX. 1856 to 1876.— Ditto, small. XXI. 1876 to 1896. — Roman letter, capitals. The various forms of the leopard’s head crowned, and of the lion passant, afford such material aid in determining the date of a piece of plate, and in enabling the letters of one alphabet to be readily distinguished from those of another, that engravings have been given of those marks at the foot of each alphabet. The Old English of 1695 may by their aid be instantly distinguished from the same letter in Alphabet V., the Roman capitals of Alphabet VI. from those of Alphabet XIII., and so on. It will be seen that in this way the addition of the leopard’s head and lion’s head erased renders any small and accidental inaccuracies in the letters and their shields of com- paratively little importance. APP. B.] L on don Date- L etters . 355 356 London Date-Letters. [app. b. Arp. b.] London Date-Letters. 357 358 London Date-Letters. [app. b. * From 1716— 1720 as before. From 1720— 1729 the punches are of uncertain shape; some look like old damaged punches of before 1697 brought again into use. From 1729—1739 the punches were a plain oblong rectangle lor tne lion passant, and a plain angular heraldic shield for the leopard’s head crowned. APP. B.] London Date-Letters . 359 360 London Date-Letters. [app. b, XX. f i 1 1856 1857 1858 1859 1860 1861 1862 1863 1864 1865 1866 1867 1868 1869 1870 1871 1872 1873 1874 1875 As before. XXT. 1876 1877 1878 1879 1880 1881 1882 1883 1884 1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 1892 1893 1894 1895 As before. NOTE. Since 1697, if not earlier, the London marks have been of several sizes so as to suit large and small articles, and whilst the largest size of punch bears the marks as they are here given, the smaller sizes often have the letter, lion pas- sant, or other mark, on a plain square or oblong with the corners slightly cut off ; sometimes, how- ever, they are a small edition of the full-sized marks. MARKS. 1. Leopard’s head. 2. Maker’s mark. 3. Date-letter. 5. Sovereign’s head. 4. Lion passant. app. b.] Old York Date-Letters, Prior to 1701. 361 1561 1584 1607 1632 1562 ip 1585 1608 1633 1563 1586 1609 © 1634 1564 1587 1610 1635 1565 1588 w 1611 © 1636 1566 1589 f 1612 © 1637 1567 1590 w 1613 a 1638 1568 1591 i) 1614 © 1639 1569 1592 i 1615 1640 m 1570 i 1593 1616 1641 1571 1594 1617 ; ® 1642 1572 1595 1618 1643 1573 1596 m 1619 1644 1574 1597 1620 1645 1575 1598 1621 1646 1576 1599 w 1622 1647 X 1577 1600 m 1623 1648 m 1578 1601 w 1624 1649 1579 1602 1625 1650 1580 1603 1 1626 1651 1581 1604 W 1627 1652 1582 1605 W 1628 1653 15 1583 1606 1629 1654 jgj 1630 $ 1655 9 1656 1631 MARKS. 1. Old York mark. 2. Maker’s mark. 3. Date-letter. 362 Old York Date-Letters , Prior to 1701 [app. b. app. b.] Old Norwich Date-Letters , Prior to 1701. 363 1564 1584 1604 1624 $1 1565 1585 1605 1625 o 1566 1586 1606 1626 IS 1567 1587 1607 1627 11 1568 1588 1608 1628 1569 1589 1609 1629 1570 1590 1610 1630 1571 1591 1611 1631 1572 1592 1612 B 1632 1573 1593 1613 1633 1574 1594 1614 © 1634 1575 1595 1615 1635 1576 1596 1616 m 1636 1577 1597 1617 1637 1578 1598 1618 1638 1579 1599 1619 1639 1580 1600 1620 w> 1640 1581 1601 1621 1641 1582 1602 1622 1C42 1583 1603 1623 1643 MARKS. 1. Norwich mark. 2. Maker’s mark. 3. Date-letter. 4. Double-seeded rose crowned. Note.— T his fourth mark is found in 1627-32-34-36-40, but not on the early Elizabethan specimens. Probably no Date-letter used. 364 Old Norwich Date- Letters > Prior to 1701 . [app. b. 1644 1664 1684 1685 1645 1665 OLD 1646 1666 1686 i CHESTER DATE- 1647 1667 1687 LETTERS, 1 i 1648 1668 1688 1689- -1697. 1649 1669 w 1689 A 1689 1650 1670 1690 B 1690 1651 § 1671 1691 C 1691 G u 1652 1672 1692 D 1692 1653 "oS P 1673 1693 E 1693 O 1654 G 1674 1694 1694 F 1655 1 1675 1695 1695 £ G 1656 1676 1696 H 1696 1657 1677 m 1697 I 1697 1658 1678 | 1 MARKS. 1659 1679 1. City arms — 3 lions 1 pass, dim., impaled 1 with 1 ) garbs, also 1660 1680 dim. 2. City crest — a sword erect. 3. Maker’s mark. 1661 1681 4. Date-letter (characteri of alphabet un- known). 1662 1663 1682 1683 MARKS. 1. Norwich mark. 2. Maker’s mark. 3 Date-letter. Note.— Some specimens of 1660-85 hear a rose-sprig and a crown on separate stamps; others a seeded rose and a crown on separate stamps, in addition to the Norwich and maker’s mark, but no date-letter. Specimens of c. 1685-95 have a seeded rose crowned and an irregular date-letter. APP. B.] Modern York Date- Letters, 1787-1856. 36 i 1787 1812 ® 1837 1788 6 1813 B 1838 1789 ( 1814 C 1839 ( 2 ® 1790 & 1815 D 1840 | 1791 t 1816 E 1841 1792 f 1817 F 1842 ® 1793 ff 1818 G 1843 REMARKS. 1794 I) 1819 H 1844 In consequence of the I loss of the Assay-Office (U 1795 l 1820 1845 hooks, and the small amount of plate stamped 1796 ft 1821 K 1846 at York, it is impossible to give alphabets for the 1797 I 1822 L M 1847 interval between 1701 and 1787. Roman capitals of large size were used 1798 m 1823 1848 from 1701 to 1726, coupled with the marks for Bri- ( S) 1799 it 1824 N 1849 tannia standard plate till 1720. The office did not 0 1800 0 1825 0 P 1850 1851 work continuously, and seems to have ceased to assay about 1847, though p 1801 p 1826 plate was occasionally stamped until 1856. Q <§> 1802 <1 1827 1852 R 1803 r 1828 R 1853 (See p. 102.) S 1804 c. 1829 S 1854 T 1805 1806 t 1830 T 1855 U ti 1831 U 1856 Y 1807 ft 1832 W 1808 ft} 1833 X 1809 V 1834 Y 1810 i? 1835 z 1811 1836 MARKS, 1787—1856. 1. Modern York mark. 2. Leopard’s head crowned. 3. Maker’s mark. 4. Date-letter. 5. Lion passant. And (from 1784) 6. Sovereign’s head. Oi 366 Exeter Date-Letters. [app. b. 1701 53 1725 A j 1749 A 1773 m 1702 b 1726 B 1750 B 1774 0 1703 c 1727 C 1751 ! C 1775 m 1704 5 1728 D 1 1752 D 1776 E 1705 © 1729 E I 1753 E 1777 15 170G i 1730 f ; 1754 F 1778 Gr 1707 g 1731 G 1755 G 1779 H 1708 h 1732 H 1756 H 1780 w 1709 © 1733 I j 1757 I 1781 1710 k 1734 K 1758 I 1782 L 1711 1 1735 L 1759 ! K 1783 1712 in 1736 M 1760 L 1784 N 1713 n 1737 N 1761 M 1785 1714 0 1738 O 1762 i N 1786 P 1715 p 1739 P 1763 O 1787 Q 1716 i q 1740 0 1764 P 1788 m 1717 1741 R 1765 q 1789 1718 s 1742 s 1766 r 1790 T 1719 t 1743 T 1767 f 1791 1 ® 1720 u 1744 ! U 1768 t 1792 W 1721 w 1745 w 1769 u 1793 X 1722 X 1746 1 X 1770 w 1794 Y 1723 15 1747 Y 1771 X 1795 Z 1724 (z) 1748 z 1772 y 1796 MARKS. 1. Modern Exeter mark. 2. Leopard’s head crowned. 3. Maker’s mark. 4. Date-letter. 5. Lion passant. And (from 1784) 6. Sovereign’s head. Note. — From 1701 till 1720, Britannia and Lion’s head erased instead of the Leopard’s head crowned and Lion passant, on silver. app. b.] Exeter Date-Letters . 36 7 ® 1797 ® 1817 91 1837 A 1857 B 1798 b 1818 35 1838 B 1858 C 1799 C 1819 C 1839 ! C 1859 D 1800 d 1820 m 1840 D 1860 E 1801 e 1821 as 1841 E 1861 F 1802 f 1822 f 1842 F 1862 G 1803 g 1823 as .1843 G 1863 H 1804 h 1824 fi 1844 H 1864 I 1805 i 1825 3 1845 I 1865 K 1806 k 1826 1846 K 1866 L 1807 1 1827 | * 1847 L 1867 M 1808 m 1828 | JH 1848 M 1868 N 1809 n 1829 & 1849 N 1869 0 1810 o 1830 <& 1850 O 1870 P 1811 P 1831 ¥ 1851 P 1871 Q 1812 q 1832 <& 1852 Q 1872 R 1813 r 1833 R 1853 R 1873 S 1814 s 1834 1854 S 1874 T 1815 t 1835 C 1855 T 1875 U 1816 u 1836 m 1856 U 1876 MARKS. 1. Modern Exeter mark. 2. Maker’s mark. 3. Date-letter. 4. Lion passant. 5. Sovereign’s head. 368 Chester Date-Letters. [app. b. A B c D E (D © 1701 y 1726 ® 1752 1776 1702 1727 ! B 1753 b 1777 1703 e 1728 C 1754 c 1778 1704 & 1729 D 1755 1 d 1779 1705 8 1730 E 1756 e 1780 1706 & 1731 F 1757 f 1781 1707 $ 1732 G 1758 g 1782 1708 X 1733 H 1759 h 1783 1709 J 1734 I 1760 i 1784 T 1761 k 1785 1710 / 1735 J K 1711 X 1736 1762 1 1786 X 1737 L 1763 m 1787 1712 M 1764 n 1788 t/l/l 1738 N 1713 j 1765 o 1789 X 1739 0 1714 8 1766 p 1790 1740 1715 0S P 1767 q 1791 1741 Q 1716 J m 1768 r 1792 1717 1742 1743 00 1769 1 s t 1793 1794 1718 rJ7 1744 s 1770 u 1795 1719 & 1745 1771 V 1796 1720 u 1746 u 1772 1721 1747 V 1773 1722 w 1748 w 1774 1723 oy> lAO 1749 X 1775 1724 y 1750 1725 z 1751 MARKS. 1. Chester mark. 2. Leopard’s head crowned. 3. Maker’s mark. 4. Date-letter. 5. Lion passant. And (from 1784) 6. Sovereign’s head. Note.— From 1701 till 1720, Britannia and Lion’s head erased instead of the Leopard’s head crowned and Lion passant, on silver. app. b.j Chester Date- Letters. 369 1797 S 1818 <3 1839 a 1864 B 1798 B 1819 35 1840 1865 C 1799 C 1820 C 1841 t 1866 D 1800 D 1821 30 1842 fr 1867 E 1801 E 1822 i ® 1843 e 1868 F 1802 F 1823 1844 f 1 1869 G 1803 G 1824 <8 1845 S 1870 H 1804 H 1825 $ 1846 1871 I 1805 I 1826 3 1847 t 1872 K 1806 1 K 1827 It 1848 fc 1873 L 1807 L 1828 it 1849 l 1874 M 1808 M 1829 JR 1850 m 1875 l N 1809 ; N 1830 1851 « 1876 O 1810 o 1831 <& 1852 0 1877 P 1811 p 1832 $ 1853 V 1878 Q 1812 Q 1833 ® 1825 e 1850 F 1875 F 1826 f 1851 F 1876 G 1827 § 1852 1877 H 1828 i li 1853 1878 I 1829 i J 1854 1879 K 1830 k 1855 1880 L 1831 1 1856 1881 M 1832 m 1857 1882 N 1833 n 1858 1883 0 1834 0 1859 1884 P 1835 P 1860 1885 Q 1836 Q 1861 1886 E 1837 r 1862 * 1887 S 1838 s 1863 1888 T 1839 t 1864 1889 U 1840 u 1865 1890 v 1841 V 1866 1891 w 1842 w 1867 1892 X 1843 X 1868 1893 Y 1844 Y 1869 1894 Z 1845 z 1870 j 1895 MARKS. 1. Harp crowned. 2. Maker’s mark. 3. Date-letter. 4. Hibernia. 5. Sovereign’s head. Note. — From 1826 to 1870 the Date-letters are found in shields of many different shapes. INDEX [Marks consisting of two or more letters should be looked for under the first letter of the pair or group. ] A .... PAGE 309 d ... . • • • 330 AB . 93, 318, 339 „ linked . • • • 314 ABD # # 127 Aberdeen, marks used at . 127, 128 AC 340 „ linked . • • • 308 AC. IN .... . 344 dG ... . 343 Act, the Goldsmiths’, 7 & 8 Viet. c. 22 42, 142 AF . . . 93, 322, 325, 350 AG 126, 136 AH 329 AK 125, 327 „ linked 308 AL . . . 121,124,127,336,348 Aldegraver, designs by . . . 276 Alloy, derivation of the word . . 5 „ metals used as, with gold and silver 5 Alloys, their use 5, 8 Alms, plates and basins for . .183 Alphabetical date-letter, first men- tion of, in England . . . 27, 51 Alphabetical date-letter, first men- tion of, in France . . 22, 52 Altar candlesticks . . . . 184 AM, linked . . . 325, 327, 333 Ambassadors’ official services of plate 188 AN 335 „ linked . . . 332, 334, 340 Analyses of gold 3, 8 „ of silver . . . . 4, 8 Anchor, mark . 313, 319, 325, 335, 337 „ a Birmingham mark . 113, 115 Ancients, the, their knowledge of gold and silver .... 1 Ba. PAGE Animal, mark .... 306, 308 Animal’s head, mark . . 309, 314 Antique plate, cost of 148, 195, 258, 279 AP 347 Apostles’ spoons .... 195, 202 „ „ forgery of . . 143 AR 121, 328 Archimedes, hydrostatic test applied by 10 Arrow, broad, mark . . . . 307 AS 125, 136 As 104 ASH 328 Ashanti gold, analysis of . . 3 Assay, first mention of, in England 20, 52 „ articles exempted from . 63 „ cups of 239 „ by the cupel, when intro- duced 12, 23 Assay, by the cupel, how con- ducted 12 Assay, in the humid way, for silver 13 Assay-Office marks. See under names of towns. Assayer’s mark, why a date-letter 24, 53 „ „ when first appointed in London 53 Assayer’s mark, when first appointed at Montpellier .... 24 Augsburg, goldsmiths of . . . 18 Australian coinage, quality of . . 8 AIT 121,125 dV 345 Avoirdupois weight and Troy com- pared 15 d . . . . 121, 124 BA . 336, 337, 338 B a . . . . Ill, 333 Index . 82 BANKER-GOLDSMITHS. PAGE Banker - goldsmiths of London, notes of the . . . . . 37 B &N . . 127 Barrel, mark . . 305 „ and newt, mark . . 312 Basins, ewers and . 229 Baskets, cake and bread . . 294 BD 127, 350 BE . . 102 Beakers . 271 Bear, mark .... . . 313 Becket’s, Thomas a, cup called . 252 Bell, mark . . . . . 317 BF 320, 321 BG 343, 345 „ cypher . . 327 BI . 333 Bi . . Ill Bible, early notices of gold and silver in the . . . . 1 Bird, mark 86, 308, 310, 318, 320, 329, 333 Birds, three, mark . . 331 Birmingham, appointed an assay- town . 112 Birmingham, marks used at . 115, 372 BN . . 339 BO . 335 Borihl, what . . 23 Bottles, costrels or pilgrims’ . . 182 Boudoir furniture . . 285 Bow and arrow, mark . 319 BP 319, 328 Bristol . . . . . 67, 74, 99 Britannia, figure of, mark of new sterling silver . 39, 42, 62, 357 Britannia, figure of, as a drawback mark . Bruges, touch of . . 65 . 72, 117 BS . 342 BT, linked .... . . 310 Bu ...... . 102 Bull’s head, mark . . 310 Bullion, plate melted up to supply . 39 , , refiners, licences required by 65 MW . . 344 BY . 319 Ca . . 104 CA.HG- . 350 Candelabra .... . . 283 Candlesticks .... . 283 „ altar . . 184 Carat, meaning of the word . 6 COLOURED GOLD. PAGE Carat, value of standard gold per . 16 Carlisle, mark used at . 94 Casters , . 291 Castle and lion passant, a Norwich mark 82, 98 Castle, single, a Newcastle mark . 81, 98 ,, triple, an Edinburgh mark 120, 130 „ of three towers, an Exeter mark .... 103, 114 Castles, three on a shield, a New- castle mark . . 81, 98, 109, 115 Catherine-wheel, mark . . 96 Caudle-cups . , . 272 CB . 320 „ linked , . 315 CC 125, 319 „ linked , . 308 now WdlD . 344 CH 333, 334, 341 „ linked . 76 Chain, two links of, mark . , . 306 Chalices, ancient . 160 ,, Gothic . . . . . 163 Charles V., emperor, letter of . 55 Chester, ancient guild at , . 86 „ goldsmiths, their marks 87, 98 „ office, as re-established in 1701 107 Chester office, marks used at, since 1702 114, 368 Chinese subjects, plate engraved with 274, 286 Chronological list of plate . . 305 „ tables of date-letters 353 Church, Prof. A. H., various analyses of gold and silver by . . . 3, 4 Church plate, historical notice of English ..... 150 C, I within 315 Cisterns and fountains . . . 289 CJ 127 CL 125, 338 CM 77, 317, 347 CO 320, 335, 339 Cocoa-nut cups . .... 241 Coffee-pots 291 Coffins, chalices found in priests’ . 161 Coin, silver, how used as weights . 16 Coinage, English, debased under Henry VIII 8 Coinage, restored under Q.Elizabeth 8,31,57 „ standard of English . . 7 Coinage Act, 1870 . . . .24 Coloured gold 14 Index. 383 COMMUNION CUPS. PAGE Communion cups . . . 155,170 Compasses and star, mark . .311 Communion flagons . . . . 180 ,, patens . . 164, 169, 179 „ plate, historical notes of 150 Copper as an alloy, use of . . . 5, 8 Cork, marks used at . . .132 Coronation regalia, made new for Charles II 34 COTON 91 CP 311 CR 80, 112 Crescent and star, mark 306, 309, 313, 315 „ and three stars, mark . 308 „ and T, mark . . . . 312 „ and W, mark . . 312, 315 Crescents, two, mark . . .311 Crown, ancient mark used at Nor- wich 84, 98 Crown, a Sheffield mark . . .115 „ and 18 or 22, mark . . 42, 43 Crowns, three, Hull mark . 91, 98 Cruet-stands 291 CS 324 CT 138 „ linked .... 322, 330 Cup, mark 307 Cupboard, arrangement of the me- diaeval 190 Cupellation, assay by . . . . 12 Cups, standing 237 „ various drinking 202, 237, 263, 269 CV 338 C, w within 315 D . 312 . . 330 Date-letters, alphabetical tables of . 353 ,, when first used and why 24, 53 „ when changed at Gold- smiths’ Hall 58 DB 331 D, c within 315 DE 334 Dealers in plate, licence required by 65 DE.BA 333 Deniers, French measure of fineness 18 DG 319 DH.RH 347 Dies, penalties for forging or coun- terfeiting 142 Diet, annual trial of . . 23,113 „ meaning of the word . . 12 ENGLAND. PAGE Dinner services, when introduced 277,279 ,, „ old plate melted up to supply .... 279, 280 DK ... 136 DO 336 Dog sejant, mark . . . . 323 DP 346 DR 323, 327 Drawback, when allowed . . . 65 DS.RS 348, 350 Dublin, Goldsmiths’ Company at, notices of 131 Dublin, Goldsmiths’ Company, its marks . . . . . . 138 Dundee, marks used at . . 127, 128 Duty on plate, when imposed 41 , 63, 105, 119, 133 Duty, articles exempt from paying . 63 . 41, 63, 120, 138 . 138 . 319, 322, 340, 341 . 343 335, 347 . 127,311,313 . . 346 . 82 . 137, 339, 340, 348 344, 345 86, 94 . . 339 Edinburgh goldsmiths and their marks . . . .118, 130, 374 Edward VI., destruction of church- plate under . 152 EF .... . 350 8 % . 343 EG ... . 327, 329, 344 8 § .... . 333 El ... 351 ED 104, 121, 317 ei 106 Electricity, testing by . . Elizabeth, great prosperity of the 13 reign of . Elizabeth, destruction of church- 186 plate under . Elizabeth, restoration of the old 156 coinage standard by 8, 31 , 57 England, analyses of gold found in 3 „ ,, silver found in 4 Duty-marks . Duty-marks, Irish DW . EA Eagle, mark EA.IS EB . EC 8G . . ED . < m . 384 Index . EM. PAGE EM 93 EP 121, 125, 340 Epergnes 294 ER 349 Erasing marks, penalties for . . 142 ES 136, 322 ,, linked 310 Escallop, mark .... 312, 320 „ and star, mark . 320, 321, 325 E sterlings, the good money of the . 7 ET 323 EV 330, 339 EW 340 <&m 345 Ewers, basins and .... 229 Exeter, ancient guild at . . 88 „ ancient marks used at .98 „ office, as re-established in 1701 103 Exeter office, marks used at since 1701 . .114,366 F . . . 320 . 320 FA 334, 335 FB . . 78 FB.ND . . 348 • . Ill FC . . 349 „ linked . 321 Feathers, plume of, an Irish mark . 133 FG 331, 332 FH . . 126 Fish, mark . . 85, 305 &% . . . . 345 FL . . 337 Flag and staff, mark . 312 Flagons, communion . . 180 Flasks . 182 Flaxman, his designs for plate . . 263 F letter, mark on im iported plate . 145 Fleur-de-lys, mark . 306, 307, 309, 312 Fleur-de-lys and leopard’s head crowned dimidiated, a York mark 75, 98 Flower, mark 305 Fo 106 Foreign plate, regulations as to im- portation of 145 Forged marks, penalties for selling wares with 142 Forks, when introduced . . . 278 Fountains and cisterns . . . 289 GOLD. PAGE PR 106 „ linked 310 France, early guilds of goldsmiths in 17, 22 Frauds, how to detect certain . . 148 „ mediaeval . . 23, 33, 139 „ modern .... 140 „ penalties for various . . 142 ES 328, 343 „ linked 315 FT 76 FV 106 FW .... 323, 325, 329, 345 „ linked 316 c 9W 347 g 121, 315 GA 334 Gateshead, marks used at .93 G, A within 336 GC 121 GD 321 Geneva, New, colony of goldsmiths at 133 „ marks used at . . . 133 GG 80, 327, 329 GH 341,342 Jo 343 Plate, abundance of, in sixteenth century 185 RC. PAGE Plate, cost of antique 148, 195, 258, 279 Plates, dinner 276 „ engraved . . . . 276 „ spice 276 Plate, the word 28 PM 79,330 PN 349 Pod with peas (?), mark . . . 306 Porringers and posnets . . . 272 Pound, Tower, weight of . . . 15 ,, Troy and Avoirdupois com- pared 15 PP 76, 326 0 & 344 PR 121, 126, 331 Prosecutions instituted by Gold- smiths’ Company . . . .143 Provincial assay towns, as re-estab- lished in 1701-2 . . . . 99 Provincial date letters, where used . 98, 114, 115 „ „ alphabets of 361 „ goldsmiths, early notices of 66 Provincial goldsmiths’ companies, establishment of . . 30, 41, 67, 90 Provincial goldsmiths, control exer- cised by London over . . . 71 Provincial goldsmiths’ work, small repute of 73 Provincial marks, often forged . . 87 „ „ some doubtful 95 Provincial touches, first mention in England of 29 PS 352 PT 121 Pudsey spoon, the . . . .197 PW 348 PY 335 Pyx, trial of the 24 Queen’s head, duty mark of the . 41, 63, 120, 138 01 330 RA 324,336,342 Ra Ill RADCLIFF 91 RB 76, 317, 318, 321, 342 RC . 96, 314, 317, 318, 321, 330, 340, 351 „ linked 333 Index , 329 ED 818,326 „ linked 308 RE 104 14c 336 Rebellion, plate melted at the great 34 Reformation, effects of the, as regards church goods . . . 150 Regalia, coronation, made new for Charles II 34 RF 313, 323 RG . . . .17, 76, 129, 132 RG.TC 342, 345 137 EH 77, 320, 326, 329, 351 „ linked 311 RH.DH 352 RH.DH.SH 352 RI 121, 124, 319 Ri 106, 108 Riley’s Memorials of London and London Life . 24, 67, 264 RK . 79, 129, 309, 322 RXj . . 326, 328 RI . 319, 320 „ linked . 313, 328 RN 324 RO . . 333, 335, 337 Rome, ancient, silver table plate used in 2 Rose, mark . 82, 86, 94, 127, 312 „ an old Carlisle mark . . . 94 „ crowned, a Norwich mark 84,98 ROWE 97 RP 314,330,350 RP.RS Ill RR . . . . 93, 108, 346, 347 RS 82, 316, 318, 320, 321, 322, 325, 352 RT . . . . ' . . .332 RU 334 RY 322 RW . . 77, 78, 79, 312, 315, 333 „ linked .... 76,317 Ryland’s Assay of Gold and Silver Wares 100, 143 S 136, 325 „ fringed ...... 306 SA, linked 322 104 Salt, mode of assaying silver by solutions of 13 ST. PAGE Salters’ Company, plate of the . . 59 Salts, standing . . 218 „ trencher .... 227 Salvers 183, 229 Sandwich, mark found at . 95 Sauce boats .... . . 280 SB 106 , 111, 312 SC . 77,345 SC.IC . 347 Sconces .... . . 284 Scotland, gold found in . 3 Scotch gold, analyses of . . 3 „ Parliament, acts of the . 116 SD . . . . 331 SE, linked .... . 310 SF, linked .... . . 315 SH . 336 „ linked .... . . 330 Sheffield, assay office established at 112 „ „ „ marks used at 115, 373 Sli.HB 347 SI 334 Silver, analysis of . . . . 4 „ as an alloy, use of . . . 5 „ frosted 14 ,, known to the ancients . . 1 „ malleability and ductility of 5 „ simple chemical test for . 14 „ specific gravity of . . 5 ,, weight of, compared with other metals 10 SL 336, 337 SM 335 SN, linked 309 SO 315 Sovereign’s head, appointed as duty mark . . . .41,63,120,138 SP 338 Specific gravity of gold ... 4 „ „ „ silver . . . 5 Spectroscope, analysis by means of . 13 Spoons, Apostles’, historical notes of 193 „ ,, their value . .195 „ flat-stemmed . . . . 198 „ Hanoverian pattern . . 199 ,. maidenhead . . . . 193 „ pierced and long pointed handles 293 Spoons, seal-headed . . . . 198 Squirrel, mark 314 SR 330 SS 96 ST 334 345 390 Index . St. PAGE St 104 Stag’s head, mark . . . 308, 334 St. Andrew’s, marks used at . 127, 129 Standards, English, for coin . . 7 ,, ,, for plate . . 8 Star, mark . . 85, 305, 313 ,, and crescent, mark . . . 306 ,, and escallop, mark . . . 320 Sterling, derivation of the word . 7 „ silver, what is . . . 7 ,, „ marks appointed for 20 „ „ new, when intro- duced . . . 39 „ „ marks . . .62 Stoneware jugs 227 Storks, three, mark . . . .331 &L\3C 335 Sun, mark . . . 308, 311, 317 SV 323, 335 SW . . . 104, 106, 321, 341, 351 &m 347 sew 344 Sword erect, a Chester mark 88, 107, 114 SY 104, 106 88 ... . PAGE . . 345 TH . . 77,78,86 , 93, 321, 325, 334 m . . . . 345, 348 TH.IC . 348 Thistle, a Scotch mark . 120, 130 TI .... 316, 331 Ti . . 334 CtBe .... . . 337 TIMBRELL . . 332 TK 124, 325, 326, 332 „ linked . 121 TL 127, 327, 329 „ linked . 308 TM .... . 79, 80, 326 ,, linked . 321, 328, 329 TN .... 313, 350 Sfo. . . . . 104 Toilet services . . 284 Touch, trial by the . . 11 ,, meaning of the word . . . 56 „ of Bruges 72, 117 ,, of Paris 8, 18, 20 Touchstone, what . . 10 testing gold and silver T 125, 312 ., and crescent 312 TA . 316, 324, 326, 329, 330, 333, 338 „ linked 316 Tankards 263 Tasters . . . . . . 270 Taunton, mark of Tazze, cups formed as TB „ linked V . TC . „ linked TD . ,, linked TD.ID . Tea kettles . „ services „ spoons , „ strainers „ urns TF . „ linked 88 . TG . 95 . . 270 94, 106, 319, 333 . 310 . . 136 . 316, 328 124, 325 95, 324, 325, 350 320, 330 . 349 . . 291 . 291 200, 294 . 293 292 . 314, 328,. 339 . . 316 . 343 322, 324 by the 11 Tower pound, weight of . . . 15 Town marks in France, early institu- tion of 22 TP 325,347 TR 104, 343 c Jr 334 Transposing marks, penalties for . 142 Tree, fish, and bell, a Glasgow mark .... 127, 128, 129 Trefoil, mark . . . . 85, 311 Trefoils, three, mark . . . . 314 Triangle, mark 314 Troy weight and Avoirdupois com- pared . . 15 Trussing cups . . 190 88.88 . . . . 343 TS . 76,94 „ linked . 329 TT 322, 342 88 . • . 343 Tumbler cups . . 275 TW . 77, 78, 137, 307 „ linked . 315, 337 TW.CW . . 346 Index. 39i unicorn’s head. YORK. PAGE Unicorn’s head, an Irish mark . 133 Unicorn, horn of the . . 240, 245 Urns, tea 292 VA 104 VI 337 Voyders 191 Yyner, Sir Robert . . . .34 WA . . . 121, 334, 335, 340, 351 W and crescent . . . .312 Wardens, the assay, duty of . . 20, 25, 30, 32 „ marks used by them . 51 Wars of the Roses, much plate lost in the 185 W atchcases, exemption from duty of 64 WB 80, 332 111 WB.IB Ill "WB. JP 348 WC . 309, 317, 320, 323, 324, 345, 346 WG . TOC WC.PC WC.TC . WD 132, 137 . 347 . 126 . 347 125, 341 PAGE # '8 . . 345 TOC .... . 343, 344 WH .... 310, 313, 323, 326 „ linked . 326, 338 WX . . . . .138, 343 WI 102, 314, 336 Windmill, mark . . . 312 Wj . 104 WK, linked . . 332 WL ..... 121, 127, 341 „ linked . . . . . . 316 WJ .... . Ill WI . 79, 127, 320, 322, 324, 327 WN . . 325 WO . 104 Workshop, contents of mediaeval goldsmith’s . . 68 WP . 345, 346 WP.JP . 348, 351 WP.RP .... . 347 WE 82, 126, 316 ,, linked . 76, 82 WS 124, 319, 320, 321, 328, 329, 347, 350 WS.RC .... . 349 WS.WP . . 347 wv . 349 WW . . . .137, 138, 326, 327 „ linked . 321 m WE Wedding rings, Act relating to Weights, Avoirdupois . ., comparative, of gold, silver, etc 10 „ silver coin used as . . 16 ,, Tower .... 15 „ Troy 15 „ Troy and Avoirdupois com- pared 15 WE.WF 352 WF 330 „ linked 76, 330 WG 125, 341 X, letter crowned, an Exeter mark 83, 89 X or italic CC linked . 310, 311 YEB, linked .... . 90 YEDS . . 90 YO 111, 336 York, ancient marks used at . . 98 „ Company, its decline . 100 ,. ,, marks used by, since 1701 . . 114 ,. .. re-established in 1701 . . 100 „ date letters used at . .361, 365 ,, the old goldsmiths of 68 . 126 . 331 . 64 . 15 THE END. BRADBURY, AGNEW, & CO., PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS. Albemarle Street, October , 1 886. MB. 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