Treasures of Silver at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge

by Oliver Rackham, John Cleaver

Overview

This is an account of the unique assemblage of silver and silver-mounted artefacts belonging to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, some of them dating back to the College's foundation 650 years ago. They include extraordinary objects such as a thirteenth-century drinking vessel made of the horn of an extinct animal, as well as the everyday tools and utensils of past centuries. Although some of them are well known to art historians, they have never been published in detail. The objects are especially significant for being documented in the College's archives from the fourteenth century onwards. The book investigates the objects' construction, how the College came by them, their original meaning and context, how they came to survive the depredations of the Civil War, what happened to those that do not survive, evidence of wear and repair, and what they were (and still are) used for.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521818803
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	12/05/2002
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	7.70(w) x 9.90(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Oliver Rackham OBE , FBA has been a Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, since 1964, and is an historical ecologist and historian of landscape.

John Cleaver is Assistant Director of Research at the Microelectronics Research Centre, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, where his research interests are in physics and the fabrication of novel microelectronic devices.

Table of Contents

Foreword by the Master of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, Professor Haroon Ahmed; Preface; 1. Outline of the college's history; 2. Introduction to plate; 3. Plate in the college; 4. The Great Horn or Bugle; 5. Plate of the gilds: the Coconut Cup; 6. Medieval college plate: mazers, seals, and the Knob; 7. Parkerians and Elizabethan plate (with a contribution by C. Hall); 8. Fellow-commoners and the Civil War; 9. Chapel plate; 10. Post-1690 drinking vessels; 11. Coffee pots, also Argyle, teapots and associated vessels; 12. Candlesticks; 13. Salvers or waiters; 14. Inkstands or standishes; 15. Casters or dredgers, cruet frames, grinders, and the administration of sugar; 16. Salts and saltspoons; 17. Mustards and mustard spoons; 18. Tools or flatware; 19. Instruments of tobacconing; 20. Sporting plate; 21. Things useful and extravagant; 22. Modernistic plate; Appendices; Bibliography.