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Lot Essay
The Society of Bucks, known also as The Ancient and Noble Order of Bucks, was founded circa 1723 and reached its height in the decades between 1750 and 1780, petering out in or shortly after 1802. Four armorial services are known to have been made for this Society, of which the present lot is the earliest, its arms copied from those used by the Order before 1757, when James Sadler engraved them. A famille rose bowl with the arms of the Society was sold Christie's London, 7 April 1997, lot 60. Like the other famed Georgian men's societies, the Society of Bucks was primarily social. Alfred Wallis in The Most Noble Order of Bucks, 1883, writes of an 18th century illustration of the Society: their club-room, decorated with a buck's head and antlers; and the social brotherhood, surrounded with bottles, bowls and glasses, appear somewhat elevated with conviviality and good cheer..." And he notes that the arms are both heraldic and allegorical, incorporating huntsmen, stags, the fable of the bundled sticks, a plough and the heads of Bacchus and Ceres.