Beaker

Valentinus (Felten) Dengel

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Salgo Collection contains two examples of an extremely rare beaker of a graceful type that has its roots in the Hungarian Gothic period. Most such beakers were melted down, but a few were part of hordes hidden during turbulent times and only recovered in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. All of these beakers have a simple trumpet-shaped form with an applied gilded and pierced girdle above the middle section. The German inscription on the lip reads, "Drink and don’t forget God your Lord 1574." Literature Judit H. Kolba. Hungarian Silver: The Nicolas M. Salgo Collection. London, 1996, p. 26, no. 4. References Elemér Kőszeghy. Magyarországi ötvösjegyek a középkortól 1867-ig / Merkzeichen der Goldschmiede Ungarns vom Mittelalter bis 1867. Budapest, 1936, likely no. 1294 [maker’s mark]. Géza Fehér. Craftsmanship in Turkish-Ruled Hungary. Budapest, 1975, n.p., fig. 59. Eva Toranová. Goldschmiedekunst in der Slowakei. Translated by Helene Katrinaková. Hanau, 1982, p. 215, nos. 197-198. Hildegard Hoos. Profanes Silber, 16.–20. Jahrhundert, Museum für Kunsthandwerk, Frankfurt am Main. Frankfurt am Main, 1992, p. 46, no. 12. [Wolfram Koeppe 2015]

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art