A BEJEWELLED KUNDAN-SET CARVED ROCK CRYSTAL STEM CUP
Mughal Northern India, 19th century

Carved in the round from a single clear rock crystal stone, presenting a splayed circular foot and tapering stem, rising to a miniature ovoid cup with a circular mouth, the exterior heavily encrusted with cabochon-cut rubies in drop-shaped Indian gold kundan setting with raised collars, the bejewelled decoration arranged in a grid-like irradiating pattern decreasing in size from the head to the foot, 3cm diam. and 6.8cm high.

Provenance: Sotheby's Paris, 'Doha / Paris, un Décor Princier', 30 June 2021, lot 160.

Miniature drinking cups of this shape and design, often referred to as 'stem' cups, were quintessential must-haves at the Mughal court, as testified in several official portraits of Mughal emperors and courtiers in the 17th and 18th centuries. It is believed that their shape was probably inspired by Chinese models, but it wasn't long before the talented Indian gem cutters and goldsmiths turned these little commodities into opulent objects of vertu and appealing accessories matching the Mughals' taste. Usually made of jade, rock crystal examples are harder to come by. For a comparable stem cup in terms of form and size, but made of jade and with an earlier dating, please see the Victoria and Albert Museum collection, London (inv. no. 02546(IS)). A group of five 18th-century Mughal bejewelled jade stem cups of similar shape to the present example successfully sold at Sotheby's London, 9 April 2014, lot 145.