Hooded St. Andrew Silver Apostle Spoon, 1580

This is a top quality, heavy gauge Elizabethan silver spoon with a good weighty feel in the hand. This documented spoon is gilt all over and features a very rare apostle figure to the terminal.

The spoon is illustrated and discussed in How - Volume 2, Chapter III, section II Plate 47 (page 142/3) - see photos. How describes this spoon as "a large hooded figure, which has never had a nimbus, is an exact duplicate of the St Andrew in the famous Astor set, London 1536". Please note that as described in the text, this St Andrew has lost his saltire cross emblem.

The condition of the spoon is superb with a good, thick bowl rim all the way around. The reverse of the bowl is engraved with slightly later dot-pricked initials "1632" over "I*W" over "I*B" and a later crest depicting a stag's head that was probably added at the time the spoon was gilded.

The bowl is stamped with a circular mark with "RC" within a rose and the reverse stem is punched thrice with a conjoined CR or RC mark. The bowl mark is illustrated in Jacksons (Pickford edition page 525 5th entry) and remains unascribed. A potential candidate for this mark would be the innovative silversmith Richard Chandler of Plymouth known for his unusual Buddha knops and Aphrodite finials - this would either mean the dating of this spoon is more in line with the 1632 inscription or there was an earlier man of the same name. See "West Country Silver Spoons & Their Makers" by Tim Kent.

An interesting, fabulous quality spoon worthy of further research.