Recently I purchased a copy of the inventory of the Earl of Fitzwalter's plate taken by his butler, Henry Longmore, on June 22, 1739 from the Essex Records Office. Among the entries for five dozen plates, the dozens of "forck's" and several candlesticks, is an entry for "4 wrought Salts Spoons" weighing 2 oz 6 dwts, or 71.5 grams. I tend to think of salt spoons along the lines of Geoffrey Wills's definition in Silver: early 18th century examples that are miniatures of ordinary spoons (130), which would not seem to distinguish them much from snuff spoons. In a previous post called Snuff Spoons or Early Salt Spoons, I asked just that question: could the small spoons we call snuff spoons also be early salt spoons?
Below is a photograph of four small spoons in my silver drawer. The smallest one is 3 1/8 inches and the largest is 3 5/16 inches. Two of these spoons are "heavy" for their size, but are only about 9 grams each. The four salt spoons in the Fitzwalter inventory weigh in at almost 17.9 grams apiece. Those seem to be some pretty heavy salt spoons.
Below is an excerpt from Longmore's inventory showing the entry for the Salts Spoons. Note also the listing for the mustard spoon weighing 9 pennyweights, or 14 grams.
Does anyone know of any early Irish salt/snuff spoons? Along with early Irish rattail teaspoons, I have not seen any early Irish salt/snuff spoons. Early Irish salt trenchers exist (see the photographs in my previous post on my visit to the San Antonio Museum of Art) - though I don't see nearly as many as English examples - so one would assume that early Irish salt spoons also existed at one time. Same for early Irish rattail teaspoons: there are early Irish tea pots, leading one to believe that teaspoons were made early on, as well.
Sources:
Essex Records Office: Estate and Family Records, D/DM F12.
Wills, Geoffrey. Silver: for pleasure and investment. New York: Arco Publishing Company, Inc., 1969. Print.
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