Coffee cup, part of 11-piece miniature service
Dateca. 1760
OriginEngland, Liverpool
MediumTin-glazed earthenware (delft)
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number1974-185,3
DescriptionCoffee, miniature coffee cup with white tin glaze decorated in blue with European landscapes in which smoke rises from the chimney of a house.Label TextEighteenth-century English porcelain tea and coffee services are frequently found intact, but many delft sets have been either disbursed (collectors and museums wanting but one example of a pattern) or largely destroyed. The few surviving miniature services in delft illustrate how the parts of a service fit together. Although some of the key pieces of the service seen here are missing (the teapot, sugar dish, and slop bowl), enough of the elements survive to give the feeling of unity that a service was intended to project. This service is important because it includes a coffeepot, something rarely found even in intact porcelain sets.
Services of this scale would have been referred to as toys in the eighteenth century, not to distinguish them from miniatures but to indicate that they were smaller than normal. Toys in that period included not only playthings but any small object. "Toy tea sets" were offered for sale in the Virginia Gazette in 1770, and in 1766, among ceramics advertised for sale in the Gazette, "enamel, tortoise, and white sets of childrens toys complete" were listed directly after tea wares.
The Liverpool attribution for this service is based on the glaze and the decoration.
InscribedNone
MarkingsNone
ProvenanceJellinek & Sampson Antiques, London
ca. 1760
ca. 1800
ca. 1740