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Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass => Unresolved Glass Queries => Topic started by: david31162 on April 08, 2005, 12:48:22 PM

Title: Early engraved glasses
Post by: david31162 on April 08, 2005, 12:48:22 PM
Two quite different glasses from my collection that id like to learn more about.
The first is 12 cm high and I think German/Czech in origin. The glass has a yellow tint, this is especially noticable in the base.
I forgot to include a photo of the base which has a is ground out concave pontil mark.
The legend reads Smollis Kynast Fiducit 21st August 1839.
Kynast is mentioned briefly in some other glass sites but I have yet to find much detail. The image is of 2 crossed swords and 2 flaming torches - is this a clue about the event it commemorates or a coat of arms? I also thought that the base cutting seems out of its time- It seems very Art Deco in style.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v210/david-dj/engraved2/glass40017.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v210/david-dj/engraved2/glass40016.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v210/david-dj/engraved2/glass40013.jpg

The second piece is 13.5cm tall with Jacobite style engraving.
It has engraved roses, thistles and another plant(laurel shaped leaves and berries).
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v210/david-dj/engraved/f10bbb41.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v210/david-dj/engraved/1a309d6a.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v210/david-dj/engraved/1c984055.jpg
Thank you
David
Title: Early engraved glasses
Post by: chopin-liszt on April 08, 2005, 03:10:24 PM
:D Hello, I didn't see any roses on the second glass, but I did see shamrocks. If it's got thistles, roses and shamrocks, could it have something to do with the "uniting" of the "kingdom". Sorry I don't know anything about the glass. Cheers, Sue
Title: Early engraved glasses
Post by: paradisetrader on April 08, 2005, 10:30:34 PM
Item 1
Would appear to be some kind of ceremonial (friendship ?) cup

Kynast
Would seem to be the name of a castle in Germany

Smallis Fiducit
Latin
Smallis ?
Fiducit - verb future tense ..my guess .."will be repaid"

I can't comment on maker or cutting
except that the base though modern(ish) looking not necessarily Deco

Item 2
I see thisles and what could be a rose bud, plus thorned stems and possibly rose hips
I agree with Sue ....a ref to the "Union" of UK +Ireland
Title: Early engraved glasses
Post by: Anne on April 08, 2005, 11:15:38 PM
Fiducit - I think this is something to do with confidence or trust (Latin for sure).

Kynast is a family name - there's a fair few genealogists researching this, also a place Kynaston in Herefordshire.. maybe a clue?.

Smallis... no idea... I thought it was Smollis from the photo but that was just my guess from the not very clear angle of the lettering. There is a literary reference to Smollis in Old Fritz and the New Era http://www.fullbooks.com/Old-Fritz-and-the-New-Era4.html "Sometimes when I see you so simpering, so modest and ceremonious, I ask myself, with anxiety, if it is the same Wolfgang Goethe, who used to drink 'Smollis' with me at merry bacchanals out of death-skulls?-" which I thought was interesting as it is a drinking reference... again perhaps a clue?

And having said all that I had another thought and found an entry in the German version of WIKIPEDIA  here  http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schmollis which when I put it through an online translator (my German being practically zero!), seems to offer an answer to your mystery... it's something about Schmollis and a drinking brotherhood.. perhaps someone who reads German can offer a better translation than the one I have here:

Quote
Schmollis (also: Smollis), already before 1795 belaid as a call under students connected with the request, to drink brotherhood and to address informally itself therewith in the future.  The origin is becomes unclearly, generally the concept of lat. sow mihi mollis amicus (German in about: "would be me shut!") diverted.  The agreeing answer was "Fiducit!", of lat. fiducia sit "it would count!"  (Of lat. fiducia "contract, agreement").  

In some younger forms of student connections, the custom was developed late that the presiding of a student-like tavern shouts after termination of a song of the Kneipgesellschaft ("Corona") : "a Schmollis the fidelen singers!", whereon the participants answer with "Fiducit!"  Of older connections, such phrases are rejected than a superfluous Schnörkel.  

In the literature, there are early records out of the first half of the 19th century, for example by * Heinrich Heine, that in the '1820er's in Göttingen studied, book of the songs (1a VIII) and in * Elias Salomon, poem »Fiducit« from the year 1835, of August Wilhelm Briesewitz vertont.  

Yet today connection students "Schmollis" drink if they would like to address informally itself.  
Title: Early engraved glasses
Post by: david31162 on April 08, 2005, 11:51:29 PM
Thanks for all that research Anne , Sue and Paradisetrader!! You have been busy.
I only found out about the castle and one reference to glass being made in/ by Kynast.
I'll get searching again. I'll also have to put up some more pictures of the plant engravings.
Thanks again
David