posted 07-08-2005 02:00 AM            

I just picked up a neat coin silver porringer marked twice, once on the bottom of the bowl and once on the bottom of the handle with the maker's name D.C. DENHAM in a rectangular cartouche. On the top of the handle is a period script monogram and date of 1825.

I am not finding much about Mr. Denham in the "Marks of American Silversmiths", by Belden, othere then that he was working c. 1820
and was wondering if there is more information about him out there somewhere? I passed on a matching spoon by him, because of the condition.

Thanks for the help, in advance.

posted 07-08-2005 04:19 PM            

I will be picking up a soup / table spoon that came with the porringer early next week. I left it behind because it had been used hard.

Thanks for your help so far.

posted 07-08-2005 04:55 PM            

porringer in question. body is 4" in diameter.. length over handle is 6 1/2".
Height is 1 7/8".

engraving and date on handle

side view of this piece

posted 07-09-2005 12:34 AM            

Yep.. No matter how I measure it it is still 1.875" high (or deep). You know .. that is deeper then most of my other poringers, and the aspect as seen in the photo is correct.. I held the piece at the same angle in front of the photo to check.

posted 07-09-2005 07:29 AM            

quote:

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An Illustrated Dictionary of Silverware
By Harold Newman
1987
Page 41-42

bleeding bowl. Bowl with pierced handle, Exeter, 1704. Wellcome Collection, Science Museum, London.

bleeding bowl. A small, shallow, flat-bottomed bowl with straight or slightly convex sides, and having one flat, horizontal, triangular, pierced handle extending from (or near) the rim. Such cups, from 10 to 13 cm in diameter, have been said to have been employed by barber-surgeons in the 17th and 18th centuries for bleeding a patient. Although some writers have doubted such usage, some old engravings depict such bowls with surgical instruments, thus confirming their use; but bowls can be identified as having served this purpose only when horizontal, graduated measuring lines are present on the interior. Bowls so used have a capacity of not more than 3 fl. 02. (85 ml), the maximum amount of blood formerly taken in blood letting. The form resembles that of the larger porringer, the smaller tea measure, and the even smaller asparagus butter-bowl and wine taster. It has been sometimes called in Britain a 'cupping bowl', but incorrectly, as in cupping the blood was drawn by a vacuum, usually into a glass receptacle. It has been suggested that some early pieces in such form may have been made to serve as the cover of a skillet, but this has been repudiated. Some were donated to churches and used as an alms dish. See Charles Noon, 'Bleeding Bowl or Skillet Cover?' in The Connoisseur, January 1942, p. 142.

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posted 07-09-2005 10:58 AM            

quote:

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Phlebotomy: The Ancient Art of Bloodletting
[mtn.org/quack/devices/phlebo.htm - link gone from the Internet]

By Graham Ford
Museum of Questionable Medical Devices

The practice of bloodletting seemed logical when the foundation of all medical treatment was based on the four body humors: blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. Health was thought to be restored by purging, starving, vomiting or bloodletting.

The art of bloodletting was flourishing well before Hippocrates in the fifth century B.C. By the middle ages, both surgeons and barbers were specializing in this bloody practice. Barbers advertised with a red (for blood) and white (for tourniquet) striped pole. The pole itself represented the stick squeezed by the patient to dilate the veins.

Bloodletting came to the U. S. on the Mayflower. The practice reached unbelievable heights in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The first U.S. president, George Washington (George Washington and 18th Century Medicine Bloodletting,)
[geocities.com/Heartland/Meadows/3122/washington.html - link gone from the Internet]
, died from a throat infection in 1799 after being drained of nine pints of blood within 24 hours. The draining of 16-30 ounces (one to four pints) of blood was typical. Blood was often caught in a shallow bowl. When the patient became faint, the "treatment" was stopped. Bleeding was often encouraged over large areas of the body by multiple incisions. By the end of the 19th century (1875-1900), phlebotomy was declared quackery.

A variety of devices were used to draw blood .....

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posted 07-12-2005 04:05 PM            

The practice of blood-letting by physicians to eliminate "evil spirits," or later, "poisons" from the body of sick persons persisted longer than most of us now realize, with the associated use of leeches for blood-letting in barber shops by "barber-surgeons" persisting well into Victorian times. Recently, there has been a reintroduction of the practice in hospitals, which now use medicinal leeches to reduce persistent edema.

The use of true porringers in silver as household items in America persisted for about a century longer than in England. A number of 19th Century examples (both Federal and Victorian) have been offered on ebay in the past several months. Nineteenth Century American examples in pewter turn up with much greater frequency than the much scarcer silver ones, having been made in great numbers both here in America and in England for export to America well into that Century. Barber shop leech jars turn up too, usually unrecognized as such, in antique malls, markets, and shows, with much greater frequency than true bleeding bowls.

Manufacture of porringers, both in silver and pewter, has never entirely ceased, being made and sold even today primarily as decorative objects, although they have been pressed into service for various practical uses such as ashtrays and paper-clip holders.

posted 07-13-2005 06:46 PM            

To let you all know, there is a fiddle handled spoon that goes with the porringer.. Same maker and also period engraved and with a date of "1825" just under the monogram.

So... it looks like if this were a bleeding bowl, the vampire involved knew his etiquette, and how to use the propper spoon, and not to drink directly from the bowl.

Well really, it appears we have a childs bowl and matching spoon that has made it down through a family, without being split up. Does not happen often..