Adam Loofs A Dutch silver-gilt small teapot,

engraved with a contemporary English cartouche enclosing a later royal cypher, probably of Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge

Previously sold Sothebys London, 11 February 1985, lot 122 where the initial was incorrectly recorded as that of Augustus, Duke of Cambridge
Van Ravenstein, Haarlem

William & Mary, A Crown on a Special Bond, loan exhibition on the occasion of William and Mary Tercentenary Commemoration, Sothebys Amsterdam, 12-22 November 1988, p. 57 no. 144

Exh. Cat. Couven-Museum Aachen, 2003, no. 70

In overall good condition. Nice colour. Legible marks under base. Very nice piece.
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The teapot made in The Hague by the court goldsmith of William III, Stadholder of the United Provinces of the Netherlands, King of England (1650-1702), is one of the earliest examples of what became the teapot’s established form. It seems almost certain that it was commissioned for an English patron. The armorial cartouche around and below the later initial and coronet is undoubtedly British  and typical of cartouches engraved for London goldsmiths circa 1700 (see Fig. 1) in addition a significant proportion of the 20 or so existing pieces of silver marked by or attributed to  Adam Loofs  are in English collections. Although tea drinking in Britain dates to the mid-17^th century - the Portuguese bride of Charles II, Catherine of Braganza (1635-1705) came with an established taste for the beverage, and Samuel Pepys first tasted it in 1660 - the teapot struggled in the early days to find a form peculiar to itself. In fact the earliest known example in Britain, one from 1670 so resembles our current idea of a coffee pot, that it is only known to have been a teapot because `tea-pott’  is inscribed on its surface.<sup>1</sup>  A silver pot by the London goldsmith Andrew Raven, currently thought to have been for coffee, has previously been described as the `last in the tradition of the earliest known teapot (of 1670)…’² This piece dates to 1700/1701, the year before the Loofs’s teapot of radically different form was hallmarked. At this date, tea was still something of a novelty and its use was evolving. In 1698, milk jugs encountered for the first time are described by Rachel, Lady Russel as `little bottles to pour milk out for tea`.³ One of the earliest mentions of a teapot in the grants of plate given to state officials such as ambassadors is in a grant to Robert Harley Speaker of the House of commons in 1702 for `2 Tea Canisters, 1 chocolate pot, 1 coffee pot, 1 tea pott.’ .<sup>4</sup> This was the same Robert Harley, Ist Earl of Oxford who owned two magnificent water jars which are now thought to be the `twee buires off hooge watterkruycken’ (Two buires or tall water jars) ordered by William III and made by Adam Loofs in 1681 .⁵ 
The court at The Hague

The title of Stadholder, in earlier times a representative (lieutenant) of the monarch, was under the Dutch Republic, a highly important, primarily military office subject to the various states of the republic.  The States General met at the Hague and the Hague was also seat of the Stadholder’s court, attracting embassies from all over the significant world, `keen to show off their wealth and introduce the latest fashions from abroad ’.⁶ William of Orange (1650-1702) was elected to the position in an increasing number of provinces from 1672 after a period of twenty-two years without a Stadholder. Following William’s military successes and marriage to Mary Stuart, heir to the throne of Great Britain in 1677, The Hague was experiencing a resurgence of its former glory. Paris was then considered the zenith of fashion and Mary brought silver furniture with her, outshining what then existed at the Dutch court.  In 1679 she acquired more silver from Paris, two tables with matching mirrors and 4 gueridons. This silver furniture which caused a sensation on its arrival at The Hague in September was accompanied by the goldsmith Adolf Loos, who although not ultimately responsible for its creation had certainly worked on it in Paris. Mediated by the Stadholder’s relative the ambassador in Paris, William von Nassau-Doijk, and by the impression of the silver itself, Loos was appointed Ordinary Gold-and Silversmith and Keeper of the Plate at William’s court in The Hague. He was given a salary of 700 gulden a year for which he became responsible for the storage, maintenance and repair of gold and silverware in all William’s palaces in the Netherlands. For additional payment he was expected to produce original pieces for the court. ⁷

 

Loofs’s circle

Adam Loofs, a native of Holland, `was more influential than the handful of documented Huguenot goldsmiths in bringing Paris design and techniques to The Hague’. ⁸ He is thought to have been born in Amsterdam circa 1645 but soon moved to Paris as a Journeyman silversmith, where he is recorded in 1670, together with Pierre Gole as one of the two elders of the Dutch embassy chapel there. The latter was himself ébéniste du Roi to Louis XIV, brother-in-law to Daniel Marot’s father, and father of Corneille who late became ébéniste to Queen Mary. Clearly Loof’s circle appears to have included some of the most important master craftsmen in Paris and probably also in wider courtly circles. In 1706 after William III’s death Loofs borrowed money from Frederick I of Prussia’s representative at The Hague with interest payable to Hans Hendrick de Moor. This was probably the same person as Jean-Henri de Moor, director of Frederick’s mirror factory at Neustadt-an-der-Dosse, and a former Paris goldsmith though like Loofs not a guild master, who between 1683 and 1696 made silver Furniture for King Christian V of Denmark. Loof’s only son Pieter married a Catherina de Moor who also came from Neustadt.⁹

 

The clients in England

E. Alfred Jones writing in 1935 in regard to the Duke of Portland’s silver, stated that, `A second Dutchman of whose skill no examples are believed to have survived in Holland itself, is Adam Loofs’. ¹⁰ Jones was referring to a beaker, a spoon and a pair of bottles that were already identified as Loofs’s work in the collection of the Ist Earl of Portland (1649-1709),  Baron Bentinck of Diepenheim and Schoonheten, the Dutch born friend and servant of William III. Jones’s comment was inaccurate. Even within the Portland collection further pieces by Loofs of great importance have subsequently been identified ( such as the Robert Harley water jars mentioned above), but it is true that English noble clients provided a significant outlet for Loofs’s work, either as recipients of the king’s generosity or as a perquisite of their stately offices. Even a number of those pieces surviving in the Netherlands seem connected to England. Examples would include a pair of figural candlesticks of 1687 (Rijksmusuem), probably made for Princess Mary; an ecuelle of 1701 with the arms of Arnold Joost van der Keppel (Gemeentemuseum, The Hague) page of honour to William III, created Earl of Albermarle, which has harp shaped handles of the same shape as the engraved side brackets of the cartouche on the teapot (also 1701); and a large monteith of 1704, ordered by the town of Den Brielle to commemorate the marriage of a town councillor Arent baron van Wassenaer who married the daughter of the earl of Portland, Anna Margriet Bentinck.¹¹ After William III’s death English grandees were still acquiring items by Loofs. A pair of serving spoons of 1709, were part of the grant of silver given to the ambassador at The Hague, the 2^nd Viscount Townsend, brother-in-law of the prime minister Sir Robert Walpole.¹²

 

The later initial

The later initial A (Fig. 2) below the coronet of a royal duke, engraved on the teapot in the style popular around 1820/30’s is almost certainly that of Prince Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge (1774-1850), 7^th son of King George III (Fig. 3).  Debretts is very clear that until the reign of Edward VII (1841-1910) the coronets of the sons and daughters of the monarch were distinguishable. Those of the sons, (other than the Prince of Wales) like the coronet of this teapot is composed of alternating cross patees and fleur-de-lis; those of the daughters two crosses, two strawberry leaves and four-fleur-de-lis.¹³   The only other son of George III whose name starts with an A and who was still alive in 1820/30 was Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex. However he is know to have used the initials AF or S
From 1818 until 1837 when his brother Ernest Augustus became king of Hanover, Adolphus Duke of Cambridge acted as viceroy in the family's German territory.  A pair of wine coolers,  with the initials of Adolphus’s sister Augusta Sophia  executed in the same style (and with the coronet used by the king's daughters) ( Fig. 4 and 5),  were sold at Sotheby’s, Schloss Marienburg, 5-15 October 2005, Works of Art from the Royal House of Hanover, lot 1220. Huge dispersals of royal Hanoverian silver were made in 1923 and other silver items coming from the Hanoverian collections in Hanover with similarly styled initials of the royal children are known or have appeared at auction.

^1. Timothy Schroder, British and Continental Gold and Silver in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 2009, vol. II,  no. 256

^{2, 3 and 4.} Schroder, p. 704

^5.Jet Pijzel-Domisse `Huguenot goldsmiths and French influence in The Hague in the late 17th century' in Beyond the Border, Huguenot Goldsmiths in Northern Europe and North America, Tessa Murdoch ed. Eastbourne, 2008, p. 36
^{6. 7, 8 and 9.} Pijzel-Dommisse, pp. 20, 28 and 29.

^10. E. Alfred Jones, Catalogue of Plate belonging to the Duke of Portland, K.G., G.C.V.O


^11. Pijzel-Domisse, pp. 31-33
^12. Christies London, 15 July, 1998, lot 130
^13. Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage 1985, p. 61-62