posted 09-19-2007 09:19 AM            

Here is the mark:

posted 09-19-2007 06:02 PM            

I would concur that it is probably not French for three reasons: the mark, the shape and the crest. The mark has the elements of a French maker’s mark of the ancien régime – initials, and crowned fleur-de-lis for a Paris maker with the 2 grains on either side of the fleur-de-lis. But the crown is “off” in that it looks like a closed crown and the fleur-de-lis and grains don’t have the right proportions.

So DB’s suggestion of a Huguenot smith makes a lot of sense.

French drinking vessels with two handles are either “écuelles”, for drinking broth or soup, or “coupes.” Coupes pretty much disappeared by the end of the 17th C to be replaced by “timbales” and “gobelets”. Handled écuelles and coupes are both wider and flatter than your cup, although they can be on a ring base, and the lip is less everted than your example.

The charming decoration is in the French taste with fluted gadroons suggesting moving liquid, and the engraved circle motifs suggesting bubbles, some bursting. If this were French I’d call it a “drageoir” or sweet-meat dish.

posted 11-14-2007 05:14 PM            

It is the mark of Robert Barbedor, the son of a Paris silversmith who was probably a huguenot.

Robert jr. turns up in Jersey in the Channel Islands c.1685 and he (or his son) are still working there c.1730.

A really nice rare example of Channel Islands silver by a good maker.