Overall assembled. Image provided by auction house. Not for public use.

Covered Sugar Bowl with Tray

Artist Nicolas-Martin Langlois (French, master 1757, active 1700s)

Date1768

MediumSilver

Dimensions.1 (sugar bowl with lid): 5 13/16 × 5 1/4 × 3 15/16 inches (14.8 × 13.34 × 10 cm)
.2 (lid): 2 3/8 × 3 3/4 inches (6.03 × 9.53 cm)
.3 (tray): 3/8 × 8 1/4 × 3 inches (0.95 × 20.96 × 7.62 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: the Lillian M. Diveley Fund

Object number2025.77.1-3

MarkingsOn reverse of tray, sugar bowl and within lid: charge mark of crowned A; Warden's mark/letter date of crowned E and maker's mark of crowned fleur-de-lis, two grains, NML, three pellets. On the border of tray on the reverse of sugar bowl and on neck of cover: discharge marks of a woman's head (large works) and a helmeted head (small works).

On View

Not on view

Terms

DescriptionA sugar bowl on four scrolling feet with rocaille mounts, the body is embossed with so-called batwing ribs beneath a frieze of rocaille motifs, the handles are double-scrolled, the lid is similarly decorated with a wild strawberry finial on a leafy base, and the circular stand features radiating fluted decoration,and a filigree borderExhibition History

Exhibition History

"Three Centuries of French Domestic Silver," Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, May 18-September 18, 1938;

“Bel ensemble. Objets de vitrine et de curiosité...orfèvrerie ancienne des XVIIe-XVIIIe et début du XIX siècles,” Ader Picard Tajan, Nouveau Drouot Paris, Salle no. 9, March 24, 1984;

“Les Stern: une famille de collectionneurs,” Christie’s, 9 Avenue Matignon, Paris, December 6–11, 2025;

Provenance

Hector Pétin (1875-1945), Paris, by May 18, 1938 [1];

Unknown collector “L.,” by March 26, 1984 [2];

Purchased at their sale, Collections d’orfèvrerie ancienne et d’objets de vitrine, Ader Picard Tajan, Paris, March 26, 1984, lot 144, by the Stern family, Paris, 1984-2025;

Purchased at their sale, Les Stern: une famille de collectionneurs, Christie’s Paris, December 11, 2025, lot 52, by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 2025.

NOTES:

[1] Hector Pétin succeeded his father-in-law, Jules Joseph Carnaud (1840-1911), as Chairman of the Board of Etablissements J. J. Carnaud et Forges de Basse-Indre, a steel and metal manufactory based in Paris. Pétin was also a prominent silver collector. He lent this sugar bowl and tray to the exhibition Three Centuries of French Silver, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, May 18-September 18, 1938. A legacy catalogue of the exhibition was published in 1960, which describes the sugar bowl and tray as “formerly in the Hector Pétin Collection.” Pétin’s son Jean joined him in business and was a collector in his own right.

[2] This collector is identified only by their initial in the catalogue of their March 26, 1984 sale.

Published References

Faith Dennis, Three Centuries of French Domestic Silver: Its Makers and Marks (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1960): I, 149, no. 206 (ill.); II, 79, no. 206 (ill.).

“Collections d’Orfèvrerie ancienne et d’objets de vitrine,” Ader Picard Tajan, Lundi 26 Mars 1984 (Paris: Ader Picard Tajan: 1984): n.p., lot 144 (ill.)

Les Stern: une famille de collectionneurs (Paris: Christie's, 2025), https://www.christies.com/en/auction/les-stern-une-famille-de-collectionneurs-31051/overview.

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