A Commonwealth sterling silver small porringer or caudle cup, London 1656 by John Cruttall (free 1655, d.c. 1695)

Of rounded circular form upon a short cylindrical foot, twin wire C scroll handles. The sides with chased stylised acanthus leaves, reserved with textured decoration, the underside with punched dotted forms. The rim engraved with initials E over T . E in Roman script. Fully marked underneath maker's mark IC above a mullet in a heart shaped punch.

Length – 8.9 cm / 3.5 inches

Weight – 37 grams / 1.19 ozt

This mark is given a probable attribution to John Cruttall in Mitchell, D., Silversmiths in Elizabethan and Stuart London: their lives and their marks, Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2017, p.350.

John Cruttall was apprenticed to the plateworker Francis Harris for eight years from the 21 May 1647. After Harris died before the 21^st January 1653 he was turned over to the prominent plateworker Daniel Rutty, becoming free by service 25 May 1655.

Two marks are ascribed to Cruttall. This, the first mark, is found upon:

A miniature bowl of 1658 (Christie’s 1910)

A porringer and cover of 1659 (Christie’s 1938)

A tankard of 1659 (Ashmolean museum)

A caudle cup of 1659 (Jackson 1921)

A footed salver of 1661 (Royal College of Physicians)

A porringer and cover of 1661 (Woolley and Wallis 2007)

An ink stand of 1663 (Christie’s 1954)

A christening basin of 1668 (St Paul’s Covent Garden)

A porringer of 1668 sold these rooms 11 Oct 2023, lot 496 (£2000 incl. prem)

A flagon of 1669 (St Paul’s Covent Garden)

A porringer of 1674 (Christie’s 1931)

A tankard of 1677 (Christie’s London, 4 Dec 2012, lot 42)