LONDON, 1690, MAKER'S MARK ID, A DAGGER BETWEEN

BRAMPTON MOOR
This fine chinoiserie porringer and cover is one of the largest and heaviest recorded. It is also important as a rare survival of a 17th century racing prize cup, the earliest recorded being the Brampton Moor Cup of 1666. While little is known of the 17th century races at Bakewell in Derbyshire it is known that 'at Bakewell a meeting was held at irregular intervals during the first forty years of the eighteenth century. Three days' racing took place in 1728, one race for galloways, give and take, another for horses and the third for 'actual' or as we should say bona fide hunters. Meetings of somewhat similar nature were held in 1732 and 1739, after which latter year they appear to have been abandoned.' (The Victoria Histories of the Counties of England, A History of Derbyshire, Vol. II, 1907, p. 290).

CHINOISERIE IN LATE 17TH CENTURY ENGLISH SILVER.
The knowledge of the culture and arts of China, Japan and the other Asian countries in London in the 17th century was formulated from the combination of travellers’ written accounts and engravings, and goods, including lacquer, porcelain and printed textiles imported by the East India Company. The taste for expensive imported teas and certain plays staged in London theatres also fed the passion for all things in the chinoiserie style.

John Nieuhoff’s An Embassy to the Grand Tartar Cham, Emperor of China, Amsterdam, published in 1665 is thought to have been the most influential printed source. Nieuhoff recounts tales of his travels with anecdotes and observations of the places visited and the people he encountered. Nieuhoff’s text is interspersed with frequent illustrations. Whilst chinoiserie flat-chased motifs depart from the Nieuhoff illustrations in the spirit of their draughtsmanship, they are clearly connected by their themes.

Chinoiserie chasing is found on over 250 objects or sets of objects made mainly, but far from entirely, in London between 1679 and 1697. The majority fall into the period 1680 to 1685. The theory proposed by Charles Oman in his Caroline Silver, London, 1970, p. 16, that they were all the production of a single workshop is no longer accepted. As Philippa Glanville observes in 'English 17th Century Chinoiserie Silver', The Jaime Ortiz-Patiño Collection, English 17th century Chinoiserie Silver, Sotheby's, New York, 21 May 1992, at least 30 toilet-services are known with chinoiserie decoration, by numerous different makers; Ralph Leake, Thomas Jenkins, Anthony Nelme, William Fowle, Jacob Bodendick, Benjamin Traherne and the makers using the marks D or ID in script and AH. This and the varying quality of the chasing has long been recognised, suggesting it was a widely used and fashionable form of ornament.

Motifs such as a dolphin fountain troupe, depicted on a casket which formed part of a rare Irish toilet service, sold in the Exceptional Sale in Christie's New York, have been linked by Glanville to the elaborate stage settings of such plays as Elkanah Settle’s The Conquest of China by the Tartars, published in 1675 and The Indian Queen of 1664. Motifs often appear on multiple objects. The distinctive male figure of a warrior with sword and an elongated fan, to the left of the coat-of-arms on the porringer of 1686, lot 186, can be found on a monteith, attributed to James Spackman, of the same year, the Metropolitan Museum New York (acc. no. 58.7.67), illustrated here.

Perhaps because of the wealth of design sources, it is surprisingly difficult to identify even the distinctive individual figures reappearing on more than one chinoiserie object. In this regard, it is particularly interesting that the figure looking at the sun, to the right of the cartouche on the present cup of 1690, is clearly taken from the same source as that on the Mildmay monteith by George Garthorne, made six years earlier, sold Christie's, London, 27 April 1983 and the Patiño collection, op. cit., lot 138. This use of a common design source some six years later clearly indicates the existence of a print or book being used by both chasers.