A vessel with spout and cover, rock crystal, carved channels and leaf decoration, damaged

A vessel and cover, fashioned in rock crystal and polished.
The vessel is rounded with a short, flared neck that is slightly narrower than the body. It stands on a short, flared and recessed foot with a rim that has four shallow, equally-spaced, v-shaped notches cut into it. The vessel has a once-integrally fashioned spout that has since been broken off and re-attached. The interior is smooth and polished (except for the spout's interior) and the exterior is decorated, on opposite sides of the vessel, with stylised unfurling leaves. Apart from the repaired spout and natural veil-like inclusions, there are a two cracks to the body, one of which is significant and penetrates one of the leaf designs.
The cover is domed with a slightly raised inner ring to the rim. The upper surface has been carved with channels radiating out to the edge. There is an arrangement of eight lozenges, each having a central polished oval recess, around the centre in a star-like formation and there is an empty, recess in the centre where a separately fashioned finial handle was once inset but which is now missing. There is a major chip to the rim with the fragment missing.

This vessel and cover were formerly in The India Museum in London and they were then transferred to the South Kensington Museum (later renamed The Victoria & Albert Museum) in 1879. 1880 Register Entry: [Room 8. Case .] '01,355. VESSEL, with spout and cover. Crystal, floral ornament.' (No slip number given.)

The vessel and the cover (apart from the attached but missing finial) were fashioned in India, probably in the late 18th century, out of single crystals of clear, colourless quartz. Rock crystal is a hard and durable material which requires patience and skill to fashion objects of this quality, especially when using rudimentary equipment such as bow-driven lathes and wheels. The craftsmen who fashioned them would have been very skilled, especially when considering the fact that the vessel's spout was originally integral with the body. Even today, with access to modern equipment and abrasives, such an object would be very difficult to reproduce. These and similar objects would only have been made for wealthy patrons. This one was acquired by the Indian Musum in London and transferred to South Kensington in 1879.
Despite being a hard material, quartz can be vulnerable to thermal and physical shock and is liable to fracture if it is subjected to impacts or a rapid and significant change in temperature. It is probable that this vessel would have been used to hold only cold to moderately warm liquids.

01355(IS) to 01355A/(IS)