CIRCA 1745, THE DECORATION VERY SLIGHTLY LATER

Details

A Chelsea dolphin salt
Circa 1745, the decoration very slightly later
Perhaps decorated in the workshop of William Duesbury, the shallow foliate bowl encrusted with moss and painted with shells, coral and waterweeds, supported by three dolphins with entwined tails, on an hexagonal base with scattered seaweed, moss and coral (some minute chipping to rim and to dolphins' tails)
3¼ in. (8.5 cm.) wide

Special notice

VAT rate of 17.5% is payable on hammer price plus buyer’s premium.

Lot Essay

The only other similar example of this rare form is a white example exhibited by Winifred Williams, 'Eighteenth Century White Porcelain' (1975), Catalogue no. 57.

It is interesting to compare this with a pen and wash design for a salt cellar, attributed to Nicholas Sprimont, in the Victoria & Albert Museum, illustrated by Christorpher Hartop, The Huguenot Legacy, English Silver 1680-1760 from the Alan and Simone Hartman Collection (1996), p. 300, where the author discusses the use of dophin supports in contemporary English silver.

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