Object: Posset Pots

When I hear of a combination of milk and beer or wine, I have to tell you, I think of a hangover remedy -- something to soothe the stomach with a little dash of hair of the dog to ease a pounding head.

Posset pots were drinking vessels usually made from tin-glazed earthenware, sometimes made from silver or glass, to drink the milk and alcohol mixture from. They had two handles and a spout and were very popular in England and Holland from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries.

Bristol Delftware Posset Pot, circa 1690; Sotheby’s NYC January 20, 2006; Realized Price: $12,000


Sometimes an egg and spices like cinnamon were added. Sometimes a sweet sherry was used instead of ale or wine. The alcohol would cause the mixture to curdle and separate and the drinker would sip the concoction through the spout.

Dutch Delft Polychrome Posset Pot 18th Century (painted in imitation of Batavian ware); Sotheby’s, Amsterdam, Netherlands, December 4, 2006; Estimate : €800 - €1,200


A little protein post a bout of too much drinking the night before is always recommended. However, I would opt out of drinking this recipe. I am covering my lips with one finger right now as my stomach turns a bit.


George II Delftware Posset Pot circa 1730-40; Christies’ London January 20, 2009; Realized: £1,625


Posset was a popular drink at celebrations such as weddings or Christmas feasts and the posset pot was passed from guest to guest each one sipping from the spout. I wouldn’t have liked to be the last one to sip this mixture. Some people tend to leave a bit of warm, thick backwash.

Posset Pot, ca. 1710 Bristol, England, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in KC.


A really good posset was said to have three different layers: the upper having foam; the middle a smooth custard; and the bottom the alcohol. The custard portion was eaten with a spoon and the leftover liquid mixture sipped through the spout. At weddings a wedding ring was sometimes thrown into the posset pot. It was thought that the person who fished it out would be the next to get married.

It was also commonly used for those in bed sick to slowly sip this milk and alcohol mixture from one of these pots. In some rural portions of England, this was practiced even up until the mid twentieth century.

English Delftware White Posset Pot, curca 1700; Sotheby’s NYC, October 20, 2003; Estimated Price: $6,000 - $8,000; failed to sell.


Some seventeenth-century recipes called for bread crumbs, eighteen yokes and three-quarters pound of sugar. (My bottom is spreading from just reading about it.) This recipe sounds similar to a bread pudding I make -- but it has a whiskey sauce mixed with butter and sugar on top. There is no curdling. There is no communal sipping sludge from the bottom. And everyone has their own portion from their own plate nibbling from their own fork.

I must not judge. Times have changed. And I am sure an eighteenth-century English woman would have thought eating a rice cake that tastes similar to Styrofoam was unappealing.

English Delftware Polychrome Posset Pot and cover, Circa 1770; Sotheby’s NYC; October 6, 2006; Estimated Price: $18,000 - $22,000; Realized Price: $66,000 !

Something about these spouts makes me feel a little uncomfortable. Anyone else?

Top image: Posset pot, Netherlands, Late 17th or early 18th century ; Victoria and Albert Museum .

Chinese Export Porcelain

Ceramic items make me nervous. I always fear bumping into one, knocking it over and watching it smash into a million bits onto the floor. I have a tendency to carry with me a large tote (currently a saucy crimson patent leather number), the width about half my height. But that doesn’t mean I can’t gently put down my tote, and appreciate the beauty of ceramic pieces while I stand very still holding my hands behind my back.

One type of ceramic ware I find of interest is Chinese export porcelain. It has an interesting history and in this market, a mid-range object over two centuries old can be purchased for a very reasonable amount.

The interesting part is that back then Westerners were doing things very similar to what we do today: take a foreign design and adapt it to our needs. And Chinese export porcelain was just that.

Way back in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Chinese porcelain had only an occasional presence in Europe. Exotic and ornamental, it was given as a gift, or accrued as part of a collection by a very important aristocrat. Its influence was intermittent. In 1498, commercial trade with China was facilitated by the Portuguese by opening the sea route around the Cape of Good Hope.

Sotheby's (London) May 14, 2008 offered this old, old plate decorated with the Portuguese royal coats of arms and the monogram IHS surrounded by a crown of thorns. Maria Antonia Pinto de Matos in The Porcelain Route, Lisbon, 1999, suggests a date of 1520-1540.

But by the year 1517, routes had improved and Chinese ceramics were carried off from their ports by large Portuguese ships. Europeans began to take a fancy for these items, along with spices silks and lacquer. In the following century, the Dutch monopolized the trade with China and everyone back at home went crazy for the porcelain “oriental” wares. Chinese forms were not that useful to Europeans. They ate different foods and had different dining practices. The Dutch began requesting European forms such as spittoons, mustard and coffee pots and narrow necked jugs – items they used daily. They would have the Chinese paint their “oriental” designs on these more usable forms.

A Pair of Chinese Export Coffee Pots for the Dutch market, circa 1735-40. Each one illustrates a Dutchman holding a walking stick. I love the serpent spout and scroll handle. Christie's (London) November 17, 1986, yes that long ago and sold for $40,000.

Chinese Export armorial platter circa 1765 with the arms of Hynam. Sotheby's (NYC), January 23, 2009.


By the eighteenth century, they were requesting to have their own family crests painted on the wares. Armorials were a more simple design, but very personal and entire sets of elaborate dinner ware were created. Furthermore, during this century the English, with their superior naval military, controlled the trade. Almost everyone had some – from the middle to the upper classes. They even made their way over to America.

By the last quarter of the century, things began to change as the production of creamware in England grew stronger with a return to quieter tones and therefore hastened the decline of the export trade.



Three blue and white mugs with landscape decoration from the eighteenth century purchased for the realized price of $540. Rago Arts and Auction Center, Lambertville, New Jersey. March 27, 2009.


Export porcelain from the eighteenth century is still readily available at modest sums – blue and white plates or a mug with a decorative dragon-shaped handle can be purchased for a couple hundred dollars.


Christie’s (London) sold this Coffee Pot with Cover on November 21, 2007. The tall tapering form has a branch handle and bird head spout. It went for about $1,000.




On April 25, 2008 Sotheby's (NYC) saw this go for the realized price of $12,500. It is painted on one side with 'The Judgment of Paris'. Supposedly this was one of the most popular European subjects to be painted on Chinese porcelain during the 1740s. This coffee pot is a lot fancier then the one above it.

With this recession coupled with the antique market the only Chinese Export items holding value are figures, animal figurines, tourines and very important armorials.
Pair of Horses. I love these.... a little hoakey, but not the price tag... Christie's (NYC) January 21, 2009.

Animal tureens made a spectacular splash to table services and were very popular in wealthy households during the mid-eighteenth century. Large tureens were made in the form of chickens, boars and ox heads. Smaller vegetable and sauce tureens made in the form of quails, crabs, chickens and ducks.

Christie's (London) July 6, 2005 for the huge realized price of.... $421,818.

Many items are coming up for auction and truly affordable. I decided to feature some of the more, ahem, expensive ones....

Tea Time !

The tea table was a culturally charged piece of furniture. It was first introduced by the Dutch and then the Portuguese princess, Catherine of Braganza, the queen of Charles II introduced it to the English court in the seventeenth century. And then its popularity quickly spread. It was new. It was beguiling. It was ambiguous. Its surface could change. It could be horizontal when in use or vertical when not. It was foldable. It was movable. It was important.

What recession? This early eighteenth century number had an estimate of $12,000-$18,000 back in October of 2008. Someone snagged it for over $48,000 at Northeast Auctions.

Important enough to hold tea and all of the exquisite expensive porcelain and silver items with which to serve it. It signified wealth and good breeding/taste. It smelled of money.

George I walnut tea table. I like the dainty pad feet. Circa 1720 available at Mallett's.

The tea table was a symbol of social rank, civility and family stability. It commanded tightly scripted ceremonies and behavior. During the first quarter on the eighteenth century, wealthy people sat around the tea table and enjoyed their luxurious commodity. They were refined, gentle, and knew proper etiquette. The tea table’s surface was decorated with expensive porcelain to drink the tea from. Drinking tea meant genteel behavior. It meant you were privileged and you could afford it.

Tea items on a tray were arranged in a specific order and served in a particular way based on age, gender and rank. People would huddle around it. So close sometimes that hot water was poured upon their heads. Tea time was formal event, with both men and women or casual with friends. It followed a strict code of etiquette. Tea warmed the body, and caffeine stimulated the mind. The finely polished mahogany of the table was a visual treat for any guest. Little children who placed their greasy fingerprints upon it were scolded. Tea tables varied from square to circular. Some had scalloped edges, and some were japanned.

Clinton Howell.

Over the century the price of tea tumbled and by century’s end, the wealthy merchant class as well as the common laborer was drinking it. Tea was portable and easily prepared and tea tables had to be stylish enough to carry out the performance of tea pouring and tea drinking. The tea table was the stage. The design had to reflect the latest fashions. The people sitting around it had to understand the performance of pouring tea and turning one’s spoon in the cup to drink from just so. Spoon etiquette was very important. One was never to stir one’s spoon, but gently fold the tea slowly from the six o’clock position to the twelve.

Tea cups with a handle were held by placing one’s fingers to the front and back of the handle with one’s pinkie up. This allowed for balance. In order to drink a cup with no handle, one only needed to place one’s thumb at the six o'clock position and one’s index and middle fingers; you could at the twelve o'clock position, but again one must gently raise one’s pinkie for balance. And never ever pick up a sugar cube with your fingers, only use sugar tongs or else risk loosing your reputation. These codes of behavior were a way to weed out those who did not belong: The bourgeoisie. The working class.

Available at Michael Lipitch (Knees on the legs look to be carved at a later date...)

Toward the end of the eighteenth century, as the price of tea dropped more modest and affordable tea tables were produced. The elite did not like this. Accusations of over indulgence, negligence and flouting of natural social order were heard. Doctors and philanthropists published articles raging against classes other than the wealthy drinking tea. They stated it was bad for the lower classes health. Hot tea would make the blood boil and even cause death. Many of the wealthy of the time believed that the social habits of the poor must be controlled. An anonymous writer wrote a pamphlet and circulated it widely. Drinking tea in the afternoon was believed to encourage “artful husseys” to drink spirits and to vent their emotions by complaining about their husbands.

Available at Charlecote.

To the elite, the practice of tea-drinking in the afternoon among working class women meant they were neglecting their knitting and daily household duties; and instead spending what their hard working husbands had earned as they wasted time sitting around the tea table gossiping and leaving their children in rags gnawing on crusts of bread.

George III rosewood tea table with an octagonal top with satinwood banding.

Tea drinking has changed since then. Most of us enjoy the taste -- served hot or cold over ice. Brewed by the hot afternoon sun or quickly made with a convenient little bag steeped in water for a matter of minutes. Add a little lemon or dab of honey and most of us are just fine regardless what we drink it from or where we come from.