Tankard
- Tankard
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The tankard is recorded in England by the thirteenth century, and it must have been among the earliest forms fashioned by American silversmiths. Patterned after English examples, this early type is characterized by sharp, vertically oriented sides, generous, sweeping handles, cusped thumbpieces, and the practical addition of a rat-tail body drop strengthening the juncture between handle and body. The Bayou Bend tankard masterfully incorporates all of these elements, integrating them with Early Baroque motifs such as the lip crenellation and the gadrooning.
Technical notes: The body and lid are raised, the two-part handle has air vents on either side at the top and a shield-shaped terminal. The lid is attached by a five-part hinge, and the thumbpiece cast.
Related examples: Dummer tankards with gadrooned lids include Jones 1913, p. 380, pl. CXVII, no. 2; Clarke and Foote 1935, no. 92, pl. XVII; Hanks 1971, pp. 277, 279–80, no. 1.
Book excerpt: David B. Warren, Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1998.
ProvenanceJohn Swain (1664–1738) and Experience Folger Swain (d. 1739), Nantucket, Massachusetts; given to their daughter Hannah (Mrs. Thomas Gardner, Sr., d. 1779); given to her son Thomas Gardner, Jr. (1736–1830); given to his son Charles Gardner (1769–1848); given to his brother Edmund Gardner (1785–1875); given to his son Edmund Barnard Gardner, Jr. (1822–1905); given to his son Edmund Gardner (1855–1910 ); given to his son Edmund Sherman Gardner (1892–1942); Virginia Newcomb Gardner (Mrs. Edmund S. Gardner), 1954; purchased by Miss Ima Hogg,1954; given to MFAH, 1969.
Exhibition History"The Decorative Arts and Crafts of Nantucket," The Nantucket Historical Association, Nantucket, MA, June 20–October 17, 1987, (LN:87.22)
Published References Phillips, John Marshall. Masterpieces of New England Silver 1650−1800. New Haven: Gallery of Fine Arts, Yale University; 1939, p. 42, pl. XIV; Bullard, John M. Captain Edmund Gardner of Nantucket and New Bedford. Milford, N.H.: Cabinet Press, 1958, pp. 89–91; Warren, David B. "A Great Texas Collection of Americana: The Bayou Bend Collection at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston." The Connoisseur 178 (September 1971), p. 52, no. 26; Warren, David B. Bayou Bend: American Furniture, Paintings and Silver from the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1975, p. 153, no. 284; Carpenter, Charles H., Jr., and Mary Grace Carpenter. The Decorative Arts and Crafts of Nantucket. New York: Dodd, Mead and Co, 1987, pp. 122–23; Kane, Patricia E., ed. Colonial Massachusetts Silversmiths and Jewelers: A Biographical Dictionary Based on the Notes of Francis Hill Bigelow and John Marshall Phillips. New Haven: Yale University Art Gallery, 1998, p. 395. Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
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