Lot 13. A German parcel-gilt silver cup and cover, Eustachius Hohmann, Nuremberg, circa 1593-1602; 26.7cm., 10 1/2 in. high; 274.4gr., 8oz. 16dwt. Estimate 6,000 — 8,000 GBP. Lot sold 32,500 GBP. Courtesy Sotheby's 2017. 

pear form, the lower body chased with foliate strap-work, the cover with stylised urn finial issuing foliate sprays cast from nature, accolee armorials to inside cover, dated 1636, the cast 'wood-cutter' stem below foliate sheet scrollwork, on a spreading circular double-dome foot embossed with husked and lobed bands.

Associated Literature: Marc Rosenberg, Janmitzer, Frankfurt, 1920, p.23-24. various other plates and pages. 
Timothy Wilson, Treasures of the Goldsmith's Art: The Michael Wellby Bequest to the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 2015, p.38-39.

Note: The arms on the left of reader (husband) are those of EHINGER of Baltzheim, and those on the right (wife) of FETZER of Ockenhausen.

The nature of the casting to the finial is reminiscent of the work of the silversmith Wenzel Janmitzer who mastered the technique of casting 'from nature', referring to the acquisition and casting acquisition of actual plant and insect specimens.

A similar cup by Tobias Wolf of Nuremberg, with sheet scrollwork finial, is in The Museum Fur Kunst Und KulturgeshichteDortmund, and illustrated in Gold Und Silber, Dortmund, 1965, no. 48. Another by the same maker is in the Rudolf-August Oetker Collection; see exhibition catalogue, Monika Bachtler et. all, Die Faszination Des Sammelns, Green Vaults, Dresden and Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, 2012, no.50.

Sotheby's. From Earth to Fire, London, 4 May 2017