Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)

Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)

Anonymous, British, late 18th–early 19th century

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In the late eighteenth century, craftsmen in London used customized engraved trade cards, similar to the modern-day business card, as a means of advertising their services and qualifications to potential clients. This is the trade card of Samuel Brunn, the gunmaker responsible for the silver-mounted Neoclassical pistols displayed nearby. Elegantly designed, the card spotlights Brunn’s impressive credentials, including royal appointments and contracts with the Board of Ordnance.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)Trade Card of the Gunmaker Samuel Brunn (active 1795–1820)

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.