MARK OF JURIAN BLANCK JR., NEW YORK, 1670-1690

Only four other marked American hoof-form spoons are recorded. These Dutch-inspired ceremonial spoons, used to commemorate births, marriages, and deaths, are rare survivals among 17th-century American silver and are exclusive to the New York region. This previously unrecorded spoon, engraved A.V.S., closely resembles another example also by Blanck, engraved K.S, in the collection of the Yale University Art Gallery (1935.252), and illustrated in Helen Burr Smith, "Four Hoof-Spoons," The Magazine Antiques, May 1944, pp. 292-94. The other American hoof spoons recorded are marked by Jacobus Vanderspiegel, Ahasuerus Hendricks and Bartholomew Le Roux. (See also Albert Scher, "Two Hoof Spoons," The Magazine Antiques, September 1978, pp. 567-69.)