Description

A handsome antique silver cruet set with a matching set of 3 silver casters and 2 silver and faceted crystal oil and vinegar bottles. The cinquefoil frame has 4 shell feet and a shaped decorative cartouche to the front with a hand engraved armorial. Each caster and bottle bears the same matching crest.

Total weight of silver 1288 grams, 41.4 troy ounces.
Caster height 17.75cm and 14cm.
Bottle height 17cm.
London 1738.
Maker Samuel Wood, known for his silver casters.
Sterling silver.

Marks. The frame and the castor bases have English silver hallmarks for London 1739, all pieces made by Samuel Wood. The large castor top has the maker and lion mark, the 2 small casters have the maker’s mark stamped twice. The bottle tops are unmarked, which is normal for this time. All matching.

Literature – The earliest cruet frames contained 3 castors and 2 glass bottles and are not found before 1700. This form is named the “Warwick” cruet after the cruet created by Anthony Nelme in 1715 for the Duke of Warwick. At this date occasionally one finds the two bottle oil and vinegar frame although this form is more usually found on the continent. Later in the 18th century the number of bottles could be as many as 8 or 10 and these would have contained a variety of sauces of the period such as soy, ketchup, tarragon etc and they may have had little sauce labels to identify the contents.

This superb antique silver condiment set is in very good condition. The bottle tops fit snugly in the circular holders on the side of the frame. The glass has that lovely Georgian colour which you don't find today. One bottle has a tiny frit at the top underneath the silver top. All fully functional, matching and original. Shows moderate signs of wear commensurate with age.

Maker: Samuel Wood

Samuel Wood (c.1704-1794), apprenticed to Thomas Bamford 1721, free 1730. First mark entered as largeworker, 1733. Second mark circa 1738. Third mark 1739. Fourth mark entered 1754. Fifth mark 1756. Warden 1758-60, and Prime Warden 1763. Through his apprenticeship to Thomas Bamford, who had been bound to Charles Adam, Wood came of a continuous line of specialist caster-makers and in turn trained both Jabez Daniell and Robert Piercey (q.v.), both clearly established also in the same line of production. Wood’s cruets and individual casters, although produced in quantity are of a uniformly high standard and one of the most attractively designed smaller items of plate, without which no reasonably equipped table of the eighteenth century appears to have been complete.

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