Topic: Info on James Powell Topaz glass - "The Queen Victoria Topaz bowl"

[flying free]

Hock glasses (according to the advert best quality Stourbridge manufacture) c.1851 :

page 341 with pictures of wine glass and decanters
top left hand corner - items from George B. Sander

Allen's Indian Mail and Register - 1851

https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Allen_s_Indian_Mail_and_Register_of_Inte/5LYOAAAAQAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=hock+glass+1830&pg=PA341&printsec=frontcover




The shape of a 'hock glass'

A snippet of possible information here (no full book to read):

Source view on google:
English, Scottish and Irish Table glass from the 16th century - G. Bernard Hughes, 1956 (page 378 possibly)

'Little is known of the Edinburgh and Leith Glass Company , although the works operated until about 1830 . ... Similar glasses catalogued as hock glasses were made in England being recorded in 1829 ' threaded and prunted at ls per pound '

[Ekimp]

So there were definitely some topaz finger bowls/glasses of some sort from somewhere 

From reply #58 above, part 3) note 1. This implies that the ice plate in the V&A is nothing to do with it as it doesn’t have the thistles or shamrocks. Also, it doesn’t have the City’s arms which the article seems to say was on the pieces at the Queen’s table, but not the other tables.

I seem to remember reading that a ‘Hock’ glass refers to the shape/size of the bowl. I think the glasses at the banquet were more likely to be this type: https://scottishantiques.com/victorian-drinking-glasses/wine-glasses?product_id=22450&limit=100  with a slim stem. Mrs Beeton says in her book “The wine to be served will determine the number and kind of glasses to be used. If, say, claret, hock and minerals are selected, then tumblers, hock and claret glasses should be provided”. Although this is later, in 1861(?), I don’t imagine she was talking about a Römers/Roemer type stem glass in general use in Britain. It might be the case that Römers are Hock glasses but not all Hock glasses are Römers. I think Hock might just be white wine, and their claret glasses are for red wine (I’m not a connoisseur ).

I think finger glasses and finger bowls are likely to be the same thing, or at least for the same purpose. I’ve not heard of ‘finger glasses’ as a type of drinking glass?

[flying free]

1) Can agree with most of your comments except the design of the hock glasses:

We cross posted .  I wrote above


'The shape of a 'hock glass'

A snippet of possible information here (no full book to read):

Source view on google:
English, Scottish and Irish Table glass from the 16th century - G. Bernard Hughes, 1956 (page 378 possibly)

'Little is known of the Edinburgh and Leith Glass Company , although the works operated until about 1830 . ... Similar glasses catalogued as hock glasses were made in England being recorded in 1829 ' threaded and prunted at ls per pound '

It's a 'snippet' view so I cannot find out what the whole thing might have said, but it seems to say they were threaded and prunted.  Which implies maybe like a roemer?


Also I've lost it now, but I just read a something from 'letters written by...' can't remember who, of the period where the author had a Canadian to stay and when he offered him a top up, the guest presented his glass held upside down.  The author says he laughed and was tempted to fill it. 
That implies that the bottom was a trumpet shape and hollow, hence the confusion of which way up to hold the glass surely?



2) Yes, I think the 'ice plate' in the V&A is an interloper in this.    Davenports patented a process of matting glass to be engraved on.  From the way I read the process it seems granules of glass were sprinkled onto the area to be matt and then 'melted' on leaving a matt surface (which could then be engraved through?).  Rather than it being mechanically matted by wheel or even acid matted.   I presume the V&A know that it was matted in the 'Davenport Patent' process so that's how they know it was from Davenports. However I have read that most of those pieces had Davenport marked on them.

[Ekimp]

Um, I don’t know. I’ll have to see if I can find something else on the definition of Hock glasses. Here are some illustrations from Mrs Beeton’s book: https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo/isabella-beeton.html . None of the glasses look like Römers even though she specifies Hock glasses.

Investing in Georgian Glass by Ward Lloyd (1969) says finger bowls were initially called ‘wash-hand glasses’. “After the middle of the [18th] century, the sides of finger bowls, while remaining straight, begun to slope outwards, and then to assume the cup shape which is familiar today.”

[flying free]

I don't have a Mrs Beeton's.  Were there original colour plates in it or drawings from the first time she produced it repeated over the editions?
Or was there only one edition ? Wikipedia says it was first produced in 1861 which is 25years, quite a long time from 1837 in fashion/style I think though?

I've just looked up some picture and come across a plate where I'm pretty sure, if it's from her book, the colour glass centrepiece is from c.1870s.  Are there plates in the appendix of glassware items?



Just going back to the use of the word 'topaz' on the descriptions.
This was 1837.  Did the descriptor 'topaz' mean coloured with uranium glass type colour, or did it mean 'amber' or a paler version of amber?


In Apsley Pellatt (1849) pp73  ( so 13 years after the Guildhall banquet)

he writes of uranium being used for gold topaz and ' it has been much in demand for hock glasses and decanters, and many ornamental articles of glass;...'

However, on page 71/72 he also writes:

'Annealing may sometimes appear complete in Glass articles that have borne the friction of deep cutting; which, when long after exposed to the influence of the atmosphere, become fractured, as it were, spontaneously.  A large quantity of Flint,or compound glass, manufactured at the Falcon Works, (of beautiful topaz tint, coloured by uranium, which became richer in hue by diminishing the usual proportion of lead, and by increasing the alkali,) fractured three months after it was cut.  Complaints from purchasers at home and abroad reached the Works, and the whole had to be replaced at the expense of the manufacturer.'

[flying free]

on Wikipedia a couple of things:

It does appear that various editions might have added colour plates?

Also under Oddities and Plagiarism there is some interesting reading on Mrs Beeton's capabilities.  So she may not be the best arbiter of what particular glasses looked like perhaps?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mrs_Beeton%27s_Book_of_Household_Management

[flying free]

Apsley Pellatt had deposited some glass articles made at Falcon Glassworks to demonstrate the glass made there, at the Royal Polytechnic Institution.
see page 94  No.1763.
The book was originally written in 1845 but then additional dates are seen throughout the link so I don't know exactly when they were deposited unfortunately.  The earliest must have been 1845 though. That said ,the information in the glass section appears to be around that year or before as there is also reference to 'silvered' glass - and the info on that, I know, is definitely earlier than 1849 when Drayton's process of silvering was in place:
https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/The_Royal_Polytechnic_Institution_Catalo/YBZdAAAAcAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=falcon+glassworks+topaz&pg=PA94&printsec=frontcover

These included:
-  some items described as 'amber' including an engraved claret jug and an engraved hock decanter and an engraved toilet decanter plus a toilet decanter with amber 'embossment of gems'
and
- a toilet decanter described as 'topaz' and as a 'new shape'.

[Ekimp]

Doesn’t sound like she was the best cook! I think you’re right on the colour plates being added later, there’s one in McConnell from 1907.

This seems quite comprehensive on British Hock glasses: https://scottishantiques.com/german-hock-wine-glasses . Seems they started out like a Römer in the Regency and got more sophisticated as time went on.

[flying free]

Oh that's a great article and selection of glasses.  Lovely.

Thinking about the colour of what might be called 'topaz' glass  and that it seems to possibly denote the colour made with uranium c.1837 , here's a photograph of some Bohemian uranium glass from c.1835 to c.1850.  There's an interesting range of colour.  Interesting to also note the foot of the tall piece 3rd from right on the middle shelf.  The foot looks quite similar in design shape to the uranium glass Queen Vic bowl:


https://antiquesandauctionnews.net/articles/Germany%60s-Passau-Glass-Museum:-A-European-Art-Glass-Treasure-/#

[flying free]

Before I forget

There was another celebration at Guildhall for Queen Victoria's golden jubilee - 50th - Tuesday 28th June 1887.

https://repository.duke.edu/dc/broadsides/bdseg19082