Coconut Cup with Scenes from the Life of David

Applied Arts of Europe

1577/78
Shell: 17th century replacement

English or Netherlandish

Coconuts, a precious curio from the New World, were so highly prized in Europe during the early modern era that they were fashioned into elegant vessels by silversmiths. They made noteworthy additions to princely curiosity cabinets and may also have served a medicinal purpose. John Parkinson’s Theatrum Botanicum (1640), for instance, credits wine drunk from a coconut with curing colic, epilepsy, and rheumatoid disorders.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Applied Arts of Europe

Title: Coconut Cup with Scenes from the Life of David
Place: London (Object made in)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1577–1578
Medium: Silver gilt and coconut shell
Dimensions: 22.9 × 11.2 × 11.6 cm (9 × 4 3/8 × 4 9/16 in.)
Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. Stanley Keith
Reference Number: 1951.72a-b
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/74879/manifest.json

Connoisseur (June 1937), p. 360 (ill.).
“Elizabethan Cocoanut Cup,” Connoisseur (May 1938), p. 260 ; advertised in same issue by Peter Guille, p. 41.
Los Angeles County Museum, Bulletin (Fall 1950), no. 7, fig. 3.
Antiques 95, 6 (June 1969), p. 818, no. 6, ill.

Art Institute of Chicago, Renaissance Decorative Arts from Chicago Collections, 3/2-6/14/1987, cat. 36
Los Angeles County Museum, Three Centuries of English Silver, 1950.

Victor Rothschild [according to letter in curarotial file].

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.