Two-Handled Cup and Cover (1677): Art, History and Details

Two-Handled Cup and Cover (1677) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Due to its size and ornament, this vessel may have functioned as a caudle cup, containing a mixture of ale or wine and bread, oatmeal, eggs, sugar, and spices that was given to women after childbirth to help them regain their strength. The scrolling foliage and exotic birds along the exterior of this cup were likely based on prints circulating in the 1600s. The reclining female figures capping the handles and the acanthus bud finial on the lid recall common architectural motifs.

Object facts

• Title: Two-Handled Cup and Cover
• Date: 1677
• Culture: England, London
• Type: Silver
• Technique: silver and silver gilt
• Dimensions: Overall: 17.2 x 11.5 cm (6 3/4 x 4 1/2 in.)
• Collection: Decorative Arts
• Department: Decorative Art and Design
• Accession number: 1958.422

A detail from the museum

Cups of this kind are often called sleeve cups since the ornament is incorporated into a pierced and chased hollow tube that slides over the gilded body of the cup.

Collection credit

Gift of Mrs. Eugene R. Miles in honor of William Mathewson Milliken in appreciation of his interests in Cleveland artists

Further reading listed by the museum

• “Annual Report of the Year 1958.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 46, no. 6 (June 1959): 111–158.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.