Images(6)

Roemer

Date1600-1650

OriginEurope, Germany or Netherlands

MediumWaldglas (green glass / forest glass)

DimensionsOH: 5 15/16"; ODiam: 2 3/4" (bowl at widest point); Diam: 2 7/16" (foot)

Credit LineMuseum Purchase, The Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections Fund

Object number2023-304

DescriptionRoemer of blown green glass: low foot of a drawn, spiraled glass thread supports an open cylindrical shaft that rises to an open and slightly oval round bowl; a wheel-notched thread of glass is applied neatly at the transition of the bowl and the shaft. The shaft decorated with two layers of four prunts, all created with a stamp made of a grid of small prunts.
Label TextSeventeenth- and early eighteenth-century German or Dutch green glass is referred to as waldglas or “forest glass” and derives its name from its green color. The stem of this roemer bears raspberry prunts that helped secure the vessel in the imbiber’s hand. Although waldglas roemers continued to be made into the early eighteenth century, two features that help date this example to the first half of the 1600s are its low foot and the wheel-notched thread of glass applied neatly at the transition of the bowl and the shaft. Often depicted in period Dutch and Flemish genre paintings, such drinking vessels are recorded in the archaeological and documentary records of early Jamestown and York County, Virginia; Maryland; New York; and New England.
ProvenanceBefore 2023, unknown; 2023 [Frides Laméris, Amsterdam, Netherlands]; 2023-present, purchased by The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (Williamsburg, VA)