TREASURE OF LONDON

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22564, 7 May 1935, Page 10

TREASURE OF LONDON

SOME FAMOUS PIECES CITY COMPANIES’ PLATE PRICELESS OBJECTS OF ART. The ancient guilds, or Livery Companies of the City of London, are familiar by name to most people, and are well known for their share in laying Jli® foundation of British commerce, throughout the many centuries of their romantic history they have been enriched by costly gifts of-'silver by individual liverymen, much of which has, happily, survivea, m spite of severe losses of priceless oDjects to meet the demands for money of monarchs and the needs of the comnames themselves. . One of the most important objects ot English plate of the Middle Ages and of the Renaissance was the salt-cellar. Ui the earliest surviving form is one fashioned like an hour-glass, of which barely a dozen are known, and ot these the ironmongers claim to have two, dated from 1518-19 and 1522-23, and the goldsmiths one, dated 1522-23. Later ceremonial salt-cellars are richly represented. There are the goldsmiths four, beginning with the famous Gibbon salt-cellar (1576-77), unique in its rockcrystal body and architectural frame, enclosing a silver figure of Neptune; the great Rogers salt-cellar. ot 1601-2. 22in high, remarkable for its crystal body; a bell-shaped salt-cellar, 1599, the recent gift of an American friend of England; and the celebrated Seymour salt-cellar, of about 16G2, intended originally as a gift to Catherine of Braganza on her marriage to Charles 11, and quaintly described by Pepye, no mean judge, as one of the “ neatest pieces of plate ” that he had ever seen. CUPS AND TANKARDS,

As would be expected in companies renowned for their hospitality, they are rich in drinking cups and tankards, almost endless in variety, from the famous Leigh Cup (1499) of the mercers and the armourers’ equally famous Richmond Cup (c. 1510). Great standing cups, commonly called “ loving cups,” may be seen in plenty; they include the unique cup of crystal and silver (1554-55), presented by bir Martin Bowes ■to the goldsmiths, who have recovered th« historic cup (1559) which they gave to Sir Hugh Mydclleton, himself a goldsmith and a benefactor, not only of that company but also of London itself, as the originator of the New River Scheme. The armourers have two eccentric gourd-shaped cups (1585-86 and 1608-9), of interest as revealing the powerful German influence on Elizabethan plate. Specimens of a rare little cup, with small ring handles, to be seen in large numbers in Oxford colleges (but not at Cambridge), belong to the mercers and clotliworkers, dated 1016-17 and 1057-58 respectively. Caudle cups, or porringers, are represented in abundance. Two more scarce Elizabethan tankards of a different form are at the Goldsmiths’ flail. Later,- Charles II and other tankards may be seen in profusion, with such splendid vessels as “ Monteith ” bowls. Earliest of these bowls is the pair (1085-80) of the skinners. Originally named after a fantastical Scot called ‘ Monsieur Mouteitli.” they were not intended for punch, but as coolers, for glasses to hang from the notched rims into the water “to cool them.” Their original purpose was largely abandoned later for use as punch bowls. HENRY VIII’S GIFT.

Among other notable drinking vessels are the fifteenth-century mazer bowls and the coconut cup (c. 1526) of the ironmongers, and the famous cup given by Henry VIII to the barber surgeons, and made in 1523-24 from designs, as is supposed, of Hans Holbein the younger (the original maple bowl has been replaced by one of silver). Another royal gift is the Royal Oak Cup (1070-77), presented to the same company by Charles 11, ami intended for the Order of Hie Royal Oak. No less precious is Pepys’s cup (1077-78), his gift to the clothworkers. There are also the five cups in the form of a cock (1005-0), and the slightly later cup fashioned like a peahen with her chicks, all at Skinners’ Hall, and unique in English plate.

Rosewater basins and ewers are represented by "a pair (dating from 1550-57 and 1574-75) recently bought by the goldsmiths from a nobleman. The ewer is of the same rare form As one (1502-63) at Winchester College, and another (1507-68) the gift of Bishop John Parkburst to his native town of Guildford. At Merchant Taylors’ Hall there are two Elizabethan basins.

Hardly a company i s without some historic relic apart from plate. < Spoons include several adorned with a figure of St. Julian, the patron saint of the innholders, of various dates from 1539.