Description:
Similar to American salvers, these examples are remarkably heavy compared to similar English salvers - perhaps because "flatting" (hammering out a sheet from an ingot) was the most difficult of all the silversmith's skills, The thinner the piece got the more likely it was to buckle, and be unusable for a salver. One of two silver salvers or waiters with three double-pad feet, which is marked "Myers" in script in a shaped rectangle twice on the base of each salver for Myer Myers (1723-1795), and engraved with the family crest of William Cecil, Lord Burghley in the county of Northampton, with two lions standing erect balanced on one hind leg while holding a sheaf of wheat or corn, all on a cap with an upturned rim (on a chapeau, gules, turned up, ermine, two lions rampant supporting a garb, proper, the dexter, argent, the sinister, azure) in the well. Fairbairn's also lists several other familes for this crest including Brownlow-Cecil, Chein, Cheine, and Loader; however, none of all the names are listed in any standard books of American heraldry. In 1661, Thomas Blount in his "Glossographia" defined the salver as: "a new fashioned piece of wrought plate broad and flat, with a foot underneath, and is used in giving Beer, or other liquid thing, to save the Carpit and Cloathes from drops." Small five- and six-sided salvers with a narrow gadrooned border edge were a routine production of Myers's workshop and were often engraved.About 1765, a different engraver took over the execution of armorials and monograms on major commissions from Myer's workshop, whose work ranks among the finest engraving found on Colonial American silver. However, Myers did not use these specialists exclusively, particularly for less demanding tasks such as crests and mongrams. This salver was one of 92 pieces in the Watson-Crichton Collection (Watson #16), acquired by the Flynts in 1954 from Victor A. Watson (1897-1974), son-in-law and partner of Lionel Alfred Crichton (1866-1938), a retail silversmith and dealer in antique plate with shops in London, New York City and Chicago. Crichton, who was considered one of Britain's most prominent silver dealers of the early 20th century, started collecting American colonial silver for his own personal interest after WWI; the Watsons refused to sell the collection until meeting the Flynts. American silver found in England with English family heirlooms has been called "loyalist silver," since many pieces came to England with returning loyalists; however, this broadly-used term does not allow for pieces sent as gifts and taken over later. Wgt. 11 1/2 ozs., 4 dwts., 6 grs.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+54.463.1 |
