MARK OF JEREMIAH DUMMER, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, CIRCA 1690

Details

AN AMERICAN SILVER TANKARD
MARK OF JEREMIAH DUMMER, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, CIRCA 1690
Tapered cylindrical with molded base band, the cover with shaped beak and incised bands at rim, the flat domed cover chased with sloping gadroons and with corkscrew thumbpiece, the scroll handle ribbed and with cast wrigglework at hinge and with cast cherub terminal with cut card join and ear above, the underside later engraved F / D*S 1750 , W.F. 1776, C.F. 1826., C.L.A. 1862, J.L.W. 1921, A.W. 1943, marked left of upper handle terminal and on cover with ID in a heart (Kane mark A)
6 1⁄8 in. (15.5 cm.) high
22 oz. 8 dwt. (697 gr.)

Provenance

Possibly the family of Rev. Urian Oakes (1631-1681), president of Harvard College 1675-1680.
With Daniel Farnham (1719-1776), and his wife Sybil Angier (1718-1797), granddaugher of Urian Oakes, circa 1750, to their son,
William Farnham (c. 1760-1826), to his daughter,
Charlotte Farnham (d. 1862), to her niece,
Charlotte Louisa Lambard Armitage (1828-1921), to her daughter,
Julia Lambard Armitage Whitman (1865-1942), to her son,
Dr. Armitage Whitman (1887-1962), New York.
With James Graham and Sons, New York.
Acquired by the present owners from the above, 21 January 1963.

Literature

Antiques, June 1953, pp. 500-501, frontispiece.
Allan Wardwell, "One Hundred Years of American Tankards," Antiques, 1 July 1966, pp. 80-81. fig 1.
American Art of The Colonies and Early Republic, exh. cat., The Art Institute of Chicago, 1971, p. 74, no. 100.
Patricia E. Kane, Colonial Massachusetts Silversmiths and Jewelers, New Haven, 1998, p. 395.

Exhibited

Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, American Art of The Colonies and Early Republic, 17 July - 13 September 1971.

Conditions of sale

Brought to you by

Julia Jones Associate Specialist

Check the condition report or get in touch for additional information about this

jjones@christies.com +212 974 4474

If you wish to view the condition report of this lot, please sign in to your account.

View condition report

Lot Essay

Rev. Urian Oakes (1631-1681) was born in England and emigrated to Massachusetts with his father in 1640. After attending Harvard in 1649, Oakes returned to England where he became a minister in Titchfield. in 1671, a delegation chose Oakes to be the new minister for a church in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he returned and eventually became a governor of Harvard, and eventually president of the college from 1679 until his death in 1681.

Jeremiah Dummer (1645-1718) was America’s first native-born silversmith. In 1659 he began his apprenticeship with émigré John Hull, first mintmaster of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, creator of the famed “Pine-Tree” shilling. Dummer himself trained John Coney, with whom he maintained a lifelong friendship. Another tankard by Dummer with similar gadrooning to the cover, corkscrew thumbpiece, and ribbed handle with cherub terminal and ear, engraved with the arms of the Saltonstall, Cotton, and Brooks families, is illustrated in H. Clarke and H. Foote, Jeremiah Dummer: Colonial Craftsman & Merchant 1645-1718, New York, 1970, pp. 146 and 157, plate XVII.

More from Important Americana

View All