This plain copper alloy cup, orginally gilded, imitates silver-gilt versions and is, in its form, a standing bowl, which would originally have had a cover. Throughout the Middle ages and into the Renaissance, prestige lay in the ownership and display of gold and silver drinking vessels.Large cups like this were used on formal occasions for ceremonial toasts and thanksgiving, and were displayed on buffets when not in use. Cups might be treasured as heirlooms, which accounts for many that survive. At banquets, cups marked the status of the chief guest and the drinking of wine was generally a ritualised ceremony.
This cup, in the form of a standing bowl, would originally have had a cover.This shape of cup seems to appear around 1500, and was known as a 'flatpece'. Its shallow wide bowl and robust, simple design has led such cups to be referred to in modern literature as 'font cups'. By the mid-16th century the shape had evolved into the shallow bowls popular in much of northern Europe. A number of font cups were later used in English churches as communion cups and patens.
This cup is of gilt copper alloy, although much of the gilding has been rubbed away. Traces survive under the trumpet shaped foot. The gilding was applied using the dangerous technique of mercury gilding: a mixture of gold powder and mercury was mixed into a paste and painted onto the surface before the mercury was burned off. Ordinances issued by the Goldsmiths' Company of London in the late 14th century forbade the gilding of base metal objects that might be passed off as gold but this was often ignored.