Ancient Italian Neoclassic Sterling Silver Coffee Pot, Milan, circa 1850

The silver coffee pot has a round mouthpiece with a marked everted rim on which rests a convex lid surmounted by a knob in the shape of a winged griffin with a border decorated with two different types of pods. The cylindrical neck, adorned with a corded band, goes down to a rounded shoulder which forms a small detachment and is embellished with the same motif as the edge of the lid. The ovoid, smooth body narrows sharply downwards to join a cup-shaped foot with an everted detachment ring. The foot itself is decorated with a corolla-shaped pod and opens into a base adorned with the same motif as the edge of the lid and the shoulder. From the shoulder, on the front, there is a long spout which ends in a griffin’s head and has at its base the head in relief of a young man with flowing hair, topped with a Persian palmette. On the back a tall and strongly curved handle of ebonized wood extends from a decorative dog’s head rhyton and ends in a bearded mask in relief.

The marks can be seen on the edge of the foot (the original descriptions are reported, as they appear on the documents of the State Archive of Milan):

1) “Forma eptagona. Globo col Zodiaco ed i setti (sic) Trioni.”
Heptagon form. Globe with the Zodiac and the seven Trioni (seven stars of the Ursa Major).
Mark of the Guarantee Office in use in the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy from 1812 for works with a title of 800 thousandths.

2) “Aratro”.
Plow.
Mark of the Guarantee Office in use in the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy from 1812.

3) Capra che allatta e lettere TP.
Nursing goat and letters TP.
Mark of the silversmith Tommaso Panizza.

Reference bibliography for marks:
G. SAMBONET, Gli argenti milanesi, Milano 1987, pp. 37-40; e pp. 98 – 99.
V. DONAVER – R. DABBENE, Punzoni degli argentieri milanesi dell’800, Milano 1988, pp. 18-21 e p. 87-88, n. 91.