A GEORGE II SILVER TUMBLER CUP

MARK OF JOHN SWIFT, LONDON, 1753

Details

A GEORGE II SILVER TUMBLER CUP
MARK OF JOHN SWIFT, LONDON, 1753
Of typical form, engraved on the front with a coat-of-arms and inscription The Gift of the Honorable Robert Lee to the Company of Taylors, the reverse with further inscription, marked under base
3 3/8 in. (8.2 cm.) diameter; 6 oz. (182 gr.)

Provenance

J.P. Morgan Collection, by descent to John P. Morgan, sold Sotheby's, New York, 16 April 1936, lot 304
Charles L. Poor Collection, sold Sotheby's, New York, 26 October 2005, lot 35
With Alastair Dickenson, London

Literature

E. Alfred Jones, Illustrated Catalogue of the Collection of Plate of J. Pierpont Morgan, Esq., London, 1908, p. 34, pl. XXX no. 2

Engraved

The Gift of the Honbl. Robert Lee to the Company of Taylors and on the other side Richard Smith Master he was Warden in 1747-8-9 & 50. James Cox Robt. Smith Wardens A.D. 1753.

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Lot Essay

The arms are those of Lee impaling Stonhouse for Robert Lee (1706-1776), youngest son of the 1st Earl of Lichfield. He married in 1745 Catherine, 2nd daughter of Sir John Stonhouse, Bt., of Radley. He represented the city of Oxford in Parliament, and the other individuals listed on this cup were Wardens of the Oxford Company of Taylors. (See T. Schroder, British and Continental Gold and Silver in the Ashmolean Museum, Vol. I, 2009, pp. 118-120, for a discussion of a mug presented to the Oxford Company of Taylors by an honorary member.) Lee succeeded as 4th Earl of Lichfield upon the death of his nephew in 1772.

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