Stem cup, white nephrite jade set with rubies in gold, worked from a single piece of nephrite. It has a ring foot, tall stem with curving sides, and cup with tall sides. Formerly in the Guthrie Collection. Guthrie no. 82 (original Guthrie paper label on bottom) of foot)

The stem cup has been fashioned from a single piece of white nephrite jade with a reasonable overall polish. The bowl of the cup flares slightly towards the rim which has been carved with a slightly thicker, external band. The bowl is attached to a tall, outwardly curved stem and it stands on a foot that is flat except for a central, unevenly carved, concave depression. Immediately above the foot is a band of twelve pale cabochon rubies in reflective, closed-back gold settings .

This cup was originally in the Guthrie collection and was purchased together with objects [02537(IS) and 02537A/(IS)] for the sum of £20-0-0, when he sold 81 of his objects to The India Museum in 1868. It was subsequently transferred to The South Kensington Museum (later renamed The Victoria & Albert Museum) in 1879.

Charles Seton Guthrie was an important collector of eastern coins and Mughal Empire jade and rock crystal objects. He was the second son of Scottish parents, both of whom were from noble and landed families, and his father worked for the East India Company in Calcutta.
Guthrie most probably developed his interest in jade and rock crystal when he studied geology as a 17 year old cadet in 1825 in Addiscombe, and he joined the Bengal Engineers in 1828.
Through his family’s established connection with the Inglis and Lister families, he became acquainted with Harry Inglis and his Anglo-Indian wife Sophia (nee Lister). He may well have received gifts of objects that Harry had acquired as proceeds from his Indian military campaigns. Harry was the son and heir of George Inglis who owned Inglis & Co., a large Indian trading company.
During his time in India, Charles Guthrie enhanced his collections with acquisitions financed by his army pay and also income from properties in his late mother’s estate.
He subsequently retired at the honorary rank of Colonel in 1857, although he returned to England in 1855, at the same time as Harry and Sophia, due to having 2 years of accumulated leave.
Following Harry’s death in 1860, his embalmed body was returned to India, accompanied by Sophia and Charles, where it was interred in an above-ground tomb. Sophia inherited Harry’s vast estate, which almost certainly contained many fine jewels and Mughal objects. Sophia began living together with Charles in Calcutta, bearing him a son in 1862. Following a financially significant arrangement being agreed by Sophia with Charles, the two eventually married in 1863 with the family returning to England a short time thereafter.
Sophia died in 1866, with Charles being named as an executor with instruction to liquidate her un-itemised English estate which included “jewels, trinkets and shawls”.
Soon thereafter, in 1868, Guthrie sold part of his collection of jade and rock crystal objects to The India Museum and his large coin collection to a museum in Germany. Colonel Charles Seton Guthrie died in 1874 and the remainder of his collections was sold at auction, in accordance with the terms of his will, with many objects finding their way into other important collections and then subsequently to the museum.

This cup, worked from a single piece of white nephrite jade by a craftsman at the Mughal court, probably in the late 17th or early 18th century, copies a standard Chinese shape. The manufacture of artefacts from imported jade seems to have developed quickly at the court from the beginning of the 17th century, probably as a result of the presence of the Iranian superintendent of the royal goldsmiths' department, Sa'ida-ye Gilani. He was as renowned for his skill at working hardstones as he was for his goldsmithing and enamelling, and was also a calligrapher and poet.

The cup was originally part of the extensive collection of Mughal hardstones formed by Colonel Charles Seton Guthrie (1808-1874). He had served in the Indian Army, in the Bengal Engineers, and returned to Britain in 1857. It is not known whether he formed his collection in India, or after his retirement through agents in India. This piece was bought from Guthrie by the Indian Museum in 1868, and was transferred to the South Kensington Museum (later renamed the Victoria and Albert Museum) in 1879.

02546(IS)