Each on shaped lozenge base with gadrooned border, the fluted helmet shaped bodies each with leaf-capped scrolling handle, engraved with a coat-of-arms on one side and a crest on the other, marked beneath the spout, further engraved underneath with scratch weight 74:19
8¹⁄₂ in. (21.5 cm.)
36 oz. 19 dwt. (1,150 gr.)
The arms are those of Allen impaling Holder, almost certainly for Ralph Allen (1693-1764) of Prior Park, Bath and his second wife Elizabeth Holder (d.1766), whom he married at St. Martin-in-the-Fields in 1736.

Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 28 June 1933, lot 111 (£35).

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Lot Essay

The same arms are engraved on an inkstand by Paul de Lamerie of 1749, now in the collection of Colonial Williamsburg. In her will Elizabeth Allen, Ralph's widow, leaves an inkstand to the 'Bishop of Gloster [sic.]'. Ralph Allen made a fortune through his role as postmaster in Bath and his wide reaching reforms of the postal system. He made a second fortune through the purchase of the quarries around Bath and his promotion of Bath stone. He built Prior Park, a magnificent Palladian mansion on the edge of Bath.