Cup and cover, 'The Swiney Bequest', silver, parcel-gilt and niello, London hallmarks for 1857-58, mark of Robert Garrard (II), designed by Daniel Maclise RA.

This cup and cover is a prime example of 19th century historicism in English goldsmiths' work. It is in the German Renaissance style, loosely based on the type of columbine cup produced in Nuremberg workshops in the 16th and 17th centuries. It has a waisted body, the base and cover cast and chased with lobes, scrolls and fleur-de-lys. The central section is engraved, inlaid with niello, with a scene of the Court of Justice representing “The First Trial by Jury” in 1176 AD., the opposite side with an inscription, “20th January 1859 / Pursuant to the bequest in the Will of the late / GEORGE SWINEY ESQᴿ. M.D. / in favour of the Author of the best published / TREATISE ON JURISPRUDENCE. / This Goblet of the value of £100 containing / Gold Coin to the same amount, is presented / BY THE SOCIETY FOR THE ENCORAGEMENT OF / ARTS, MANUFACTURES AND COMMERCE, / to Alfred Swayne Taylor Esquire M.D. F.R.S. / author of a work entitled / “MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE.” At the base there are kneeling figures modelled in the round, representing bound male and female figures while the finials surmounting the cover symbolize Justice, represented by a central figure holding scales flanked by an angel of mercy and an officer of the law. Distributed on the cover are attributes of punishment, including a manacle, fetters and stones.

Acquired with support from the Horn Bequest and Koopman Rare Art

This cup and cover is a prime example of 19th century historicism in English goldsmiths’ work. It is in the German Renaissance style, loosely based on the type of columbine cup produced in Nuremberg workshops in the 16th and 17th centuries. It has a waisted body, the base and cover cast and chased with lobes, scrolls and fleur-de-lys. The central section is engraved, inlaid with niello, with a scene of the Court of Justice representing “The First Trial by Jury” in 1176 AD., the opposite side with an inscription, “20th January 1859 / Pursuant to the bequest in the Will of the late / GEORGE SWINEY ESQᴿ. M.D. / in favour of the Author of the best published / TREATISE ON JURISPRUDENCE. / This Goblet of the value of £100 containing / Gold Coin to the same amount, is presented / BY THE SOCIETY FOR THE ENCORAGEMENT OF / ARTS, MANUFACTURES AND COMMERCE, / to Alfred Swayne Taylor Esquire M.D. F.R.S. / author of a work entitled / “MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE.” At the base there are kneeling figures modelled in the round, representing bound male and female figures while the finials surmounting the cover symbolize Justice, represented by a central figure holding scales flanked by an angel of mercy and an officer of the law. Distributed on the cover are attributes of punishment, including a manacle, fetters and stones.

The Society of Arts initially sought to commission an appropriate design for the cup through open competition, offering a prize of twenty guineas for the one that would eventually be chosen. However, after three years and many entries, none were considered suitable. As a last resort, the Irish artist Daniel Maclise RA was approached who agreed to their request.

Daniel Maclise RA (1806-1870) was an Irish painter, born in Cork, who moved to London in 1827 to take up a probationary studentship at the Royal Academy where he exhibited for the first time two years later. Elected as an associate of the RA in 1835, he was made a full member in 1840. Gradually he began to concentrate on subject and historical subjects. By the late 1850s, he was at the height of his reputation as a painter of historical subjects. In 1858, he was commissioned to paint his two most monumental works, “The Meeting of Wellington and Blücher after the Battle of Waterloo” and “The Death of Nelson” for the Royal Gallery in the newly rebuilt Palace of Westminster.

The company that was to become Garrard was founded by George Wickes (1698-1761), who entered his mark at Goldsmiths’ Hall in 1722. Wickes set up business in Threadneedle Street in the City of London in 1722; the company moved to Panton Street off Haymarket trading as a goldsmith, provider of jewellery and other luxury items to an aristocratic clientele. Wickes was an accomplished silversmith known for his work in the rococo style; one of his patrons was Frederick, Prince of Wales. Two apprentices of Wickes, John Parker and Edward Wakelin, purchased the company following Wickes’ retirement in 1760. Edward Wakelin was replaced by William Taylor in 1776 and following Taylor’s death, Robert Garrard became a partner in the company in 1792. Garrard took sole control of the firm in 1802 with his sons, Robert Garrard II, James and Sebastian succeeding him in running the company, trading as R., J., & S. Garrard until James’ retirement in 1835 when the company became R. & S. Garrard. The company remained in the hands of the Garrard family until the death of Sebastian Henry Garrard, great-grandson of Robert Garrard senior in 1946. The company still trades under the Garrard name to this day.

By the middle of the 19th century, Garrards, along with firms such as Hunt & Roskell, Hancocks and Smith & Nicholson were amongst the pre-eminent goldsmiths and jewellers trading in London. In 1843, Queen Victoria appointed Garrards as the first Crown Jewellers leading to the production of numerous pieces of silverware and jewellery for the Royal Family as well as the upkeep of the Crown Jewels. Famous for the production of elaborate testimonial silver, Garrards were an obvious choice to execute Maclise’s intricate design for the Swiney cup.

This standing cup has an unbroken provenance. The Swiney Prize was established through a bequest of £5000 to the Society of Arts in the will of the physician George Swiney (1793-1844) who had garnered a reputation as an eccentric in later life. After a lifetime of practice in Edinburgh, Swiney eventually retired to a life of increasing seclusion in London where he spent much of his time, writing and rewriting his will. Eventually the terms offered was a bequest of £5000 to the Royal Society of Arts, which was to be jointly administered by the RSA and the Royal College of Physicians for an award of a silver cup to the value of £100 along with a cash prize of 100 guineas for the best published work on medical or general jurisprudence. This prize was to be awarded every five years; the first was awarded in 1849, and this example was the third to be awarded which went to Alfred Swaine Taylor for his book on Medical Jurisprudence.

Alfred Swaine Taylor MD., FRCP., FRS., (1806-1880) was a foremost authority on toxicology, physiology and medical jurisprudence. Taylor was particularly interested in the application of chemistry to medicine and in 1832, was appointed to the chair of chemistry at Guy’s Hospital along with Arthur Aikin. By the mid-1850s, Taylor had been consulted on about 500 medico-legal cases and was recognised as a leading, medical jurist. His public reputation was built upon his appearance as an expert witness in a number of highly publicised murder trials. By combining legal precedent and judicial ruling with chemical and anatomical evidence he established forensic toxicology as a medical specialism. He has often been described as the father of British forensic science.

The cup, along with a large collection of medical literature remained in the family through descent until it was consigned, as part of a deceased estate, to the Bury St Edmunds auctioneers, Lacy, Scott & Knight. The cup, (lot 2077) was sold on the 5th of October 2018.

Henry Cole (1808-1882) had already gained a reputation as an efficient public servant by the mid 1840s. He had been primarily responsible for reforming the records commission and establishing the Public Record Office in 1838. He was also gaining a reputation as an effective social reformer. He assisted Rowland Hill in the implementation of the Penny Post in 1840. In 1845, he was invited by the noted civil engineer and naval architect, John Scott Russell, to join the Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce where he soon found himself appointed to a salaried position on the executive committee. He became chairman of the council in 1850 and again in 1852 and continued to be an influential member of the society throughout his life. It was Cole’s involvement with the society which placed him at the centre of a group which organised the Great Exhibition of 1851. As a consequence of this success, he was invited to be secretary of a new government department, the Department of Practical Art, which gave him control of the government schools of design. Established in 1836 in the wake of a parliamentary report into declining standards in British industrial manufacture, they were widely considered to be in need of radical reform. Cole’s new position also gave him control of the fledgling South Kensington Museum, founded with the profits from the Great Exhibition, to house collections relevant to the curriculum of the Central School of Design together with a collection of exhibits from the Great Exhibition purchased with a Treasury grant organised by Cole. The museum was to grow into the Victoria and Albert Museum, making Cole its first Director.

Cole had a long-standing interest in design reform. In 1846, with the encouragement of Prince Albert, the President of the society, the idea of awarding prizes for designs of “useful objects calculated to improve general taste” was revived. Cole submitted his own design for a ceramic tea service, manufactured by Minton of Stoke-on-Trent and was delighted to be awarded a silver medal. This success encouraged Cole to found `Felix Summerly’s Art Manufactures’ in order to commission designs for functional and attractive household objects from well established artists for commercial production. (Felix Summerly was a pseudonym sometimes used by Cole). Cole’s role was to act as a mediator between artist and manufacturer. He did not define the terms within which a design was to evolve apart from a set of rather loosely defined requirements that ornament should be subservient to the object’s function and that the ornament be “appropriate” to its use. Through his connections within the Society of Arts, Cole recruited a group of prominent artists which included the painters, Richard Redgrave and J.C. Horsley, the sculptor, John Bell and Daniel Maclise. Maclise designed a salver or card tray embellished with illustrations of the Seven Ages of Man, to be produced by the Coalport porcelain factory but it never went into production. It was probably this initial connection that persuaded Cole to recommend Maclise for the design of the Swiney cup.

Although the stipulations in Swiney’s will made it clear that the prize was to be jointly administered by the Society of Arts and the Royal College of Physicians, the design and execution of the cup remained firmly within the remit of the Society and therefore Henry Cole. Cole’s entries in his diary for 1849 give an indication of the close supervision he gave to the project. Unfortunately, Maclise had no previous experience of designing goldsmiths’ work and therefore no understanding of its practical limitations. He was asked to provide a design that could be executed for a maximum of 50 guineas. Maclise’s initial proposal was estimated to cost between 200 to 300. Consequently, the height of the cup and cover was reduced by half and all other details, scaled down in proportion with inevitable compromises being made. In an article in the Journal of Design , unsigned but almost certainly penned by Cole, the following observations were made:

“The Society, accordingly, in its dilemma went to Mr Maclise and obtained from him a design for the goblet, which, as an ideal goblet, developed in drawings of high power and artistic excellence, is as fine a work as the goldsmiths’ art of any age can show and furnishes proof of what a Bevenuto Cellini our Irish artist would become if he moved to enter upon the union of art and manufactures earnestly. But Mr Maclise’s ideal and the real goblet are two different things. Mr Maclise, alas does not appear to be learned in the present state of goldsmiths’ work; hardly cognisant of the amount of ability which it is possible to obtain for the execution of works in the precious metals, and still less the cost of production…..Work, which on a large scale, would develop beauties and grandeur of style, becomes petty and insignificant when thus reduced.”

It must however be noted that these criticisms were made of the first two Swiney cups produced. The first time the prize was awarded was in 1849 when it went to J.A. Paris and J.S.M. Fonblaque for their joint authorship of “Medical Jurisprudence,” and they were each awarded a cup. For the third, awarded in 1854 to Leone Levi for his book, “The Commercial Law of the World” a more liberal fee of 100 guineas was budgeted and Maclise was consulted over the necessary modifications. Thus the 1854 cup and the subsequent one awarded to Alfred Swaine Taylor in 1859 more closely complied with Maclise’s original concept. The finely detailed figures on the cover and around the base have been competently and skilfully modelled. The initial difficulties involved in their reduction have been successfully resolved.

The Swiney cup to Maclise’s design was subsequently produced every five years until 1914. Of the sixteen that were made by Garrards, two are in the collection of the Royal College of Physicians, London; one in silver with no gilding with London hallmarks for 1888-89 which was presented in 1889 to Charles Meymott Tidy and the other in silver-gilt which was hallmarked and presented to Charles Arthur Mercier in 1909. In this last example, the Hall of Justice scene around the body of the cup is chased and not engraved; a recommendation made initially in the 1851 article in the Journal of Design, which Maclise evidently chose to ignore.


Exhibited
An earlier version of this cup was exhibited by Garrards at The Great Exhibition, London, 1851.
Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations, New York, 1853-54 (The cup hallmarked for 1854, presented to Leone Levi).
Exposition Universelle, Paris, 1867.

This cup and cover is a prime example of 19th century historicism in English goldsmiths’ work. It is in the German Renaissance style, loosely based on the type of columbine cup produced in Nuremberg workshops in the 16th and 17th centuries.

The Society of Arts initially sought to commission an appropriate design for the cup through open competition, offering a prize of twenty guineas for the one that would eventually be chosen. However, after three years and many entries, none were considered suitable. As a last resort, the Irish artist Daniel Maclise RA was approached who agreed to their request.

Daniel Maclise RA (1806-1870) was an Irish painter, born in Cork, who moved to London in 1827 to take up a probationary studentship at the Royal Academy where he exhibited for the first time two years later. Elected as an associate of the RA in 1835, he was made a full member in 1840.

M.16:1, 2-2019