Spilling the Beans till Dawn: A 350-Year-Old Loving Cup

Among the many ceramic dishes on exhibit in our museum is this unassuming little brown stoneware bowl, donated to the Natick Historical Society in 1876. 

The bowl was originally a wedding gift to Hannah Battle on January 1, 1667. As decades passed, it became an heirloom, passed on through generations and given to three more New England women on their wedding days: Hannah Lincoln in 1688, Patricia Lincoln in 1794, and Eliza Lincoln in 1851.

 Nottinghamware bowl. Stoneware, c. 1666

If you look closely at the bowl, you can see the scar from what was probably a handle. If the bowl originally had two handles, perhaps it was a “loving cup,” a shared drinking vessel traditionally used by the bride and groom at wedding feasts.

I consulted Patricia Stamford, director of the Maryland Archaeological Conservation Lab, who examined photos of the bowl. She writes, "I would say that you do have the lower half of a Nottingham stoneware loving cup. The top edge of the piece appears to be rough in places, suggesting that the piece was broken at some point and then probably lovingly evened off to make a footed bowl."

Nottinghamware was salt-glazed brown stoneware made in Nottingham, England, from the late 1600s until the early 1800s. “Salt glazing” is just what it sounds like: during kiln firing, salt is introduced into the kiln, where it reacts with the clay to create a shiny, pitted glaze that makes brown stoneware look a bit like bronze. Nottinghamware was quite fine stoneware. This bowl is evenly thin, not thick and clunky like some more utilitarian pieces.

The underside of the bowl

Many 17th-century New England colonists owned ceramics imported from Europe. Along with locally-made pottery, a typical Massachusetts household might have had pieces from Holland, Spain, England, Portugal, and even China. England continued to import stoneware to the colonies until the end of the Revolutionary War.

We'll never know how or when this loving cup came to be broken, or who decided to give it a second life as a bowl. But I like to imagine Hannah Battle and her new husband, more than 350 years ago, sharing their first drink as a married couple from the cup.

Next time you visit the Natick Historical Society, take a look at the little brown bowl. You can view many examples of Nottinghamware loving cups on the websites of English museums--including the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, whose collection includes the example on the right.

While you look, you might like to listen to the Rolling Stones' "Loving Cup" (1972).

Exploring the South Natick Burial Ground

There are a number of historic sites around the town of Natick and we’re lucky enough that several of them are within walking distance from us here at the Natick Historical Society Museum. The South Natick Burial Ground, located at the corner of Eliot and Union Streets, behind the Eliot Church is one of the oldest burial grounds in Natick.  The parcel of land was given to Reverend Oliver Peabody, the third minister to preach in the South Natick meetinghouse, in 1731. This land was used by the early European settlers of Natick as a place to bury their dead. Today the burial ground is no longer actively being used, but for anyone interested in genealogy or Natick's history it can provide a wealth of knowledge.

The headstone of Major John Morse,
a veteran of the American Revolution

Oliver and Sarah Bacon's Memorial is one of the
 newer monuments in the burying ground,
made out of pink granite. 

Oliver Peabody's headstone, in Latin--

 notice the distinct geometric face design at the top

Many of the original European settlers of Natick are buried in the South Natick Burial Ground. Some of the family names on many of the headstones here will likely be familiar to most Natick residents. Names of places throughout Natick take their names from these old families. Walking around one can see the headstones of Morses, Bacons, Broads, Bigelows and other early settlers of Natick. 

Oliver Bacon and his wife Sarah are both buried here. Oliver Bacon was responsible for the creation of the Bacon Free Library, the building shared by the Natick Historical Society. Sarah Bacon ran a small lending library out of her home, and after she passed away, her husband Oliver donated money to fund the construction of the 1880 Bacon Free Library in her honor. Oliver Bacon was also one of the early members of the historical society provided that the lower level of the building is used as a space for the Natick Historical Society and we’ve been here ever since!

The beautifully carved headstones are certainly eye-catching and meaningful. Headstones in this burial ground date from the eighteenth to early twentieth centuries. Natick veterans from the Revolutionary War and the Civil War are marked with American flags and markers. Angels, willow trees and skulls, common in early American grave stone designs, can be seen on headstones. The Peabody family, longtime residents of Natick, has a set of rather unusual headstones here. The simple geometric designs of these faces are quite different from the more common ornate designs. 

If you are interested in learning more about some of the fascinating stories associated with the South Natick Burying Ground, please be sure to come to our upcoming Walking Tour on Wednesday October 21st at 4:30 PM and 5:30 PM. Following the walking tours at 7:00, the Bacon Free Library presents the Gravestone Girls, who will be talking headstones and graveyard designs in New England and Natick. If you are unable to join us, we’re glad to say people will also be able to take a self-guided tour of the burial ground using our new brochure available here in the NHS Museum.

We hope to see you there! 

Considering Colonial Compasses

We get all kinds of interesting requests for research here at the Natick Historical Society. Following some recent research requests on Colonial surveyors I started looking into the tools that were used to describe, measure and survey land in our early history. The buying and selling of large plots of land was an important business throughout Colonial Massachusetts. Subdividing land and acquiring new property were especially important parts of the early years of Natick’s history, when European settlers parceled off and purchased land from the Native American residents. In the collection of the Natick Historical Society we have a number of different items that would have been used by surveyors:  chains, stakes, and compasses that would be used in different ways to determine the size, shape and characteristics of pieces of land. Two of these pieces, a pair of surveyors compasses manufactured in Boston in the mid-1700s, are especially striking.

John Dupee's  Surveyor's Compass

Thomas Greenough's Compass 

Detail of John Dupee's Compass, notice the specific directions to his shop in Boston

    These compasses or circumferentors to use the technical term, were created by Thomas Greenough and John Dupee respectively and both represent excellent examples of American Colonial craftsmanship. The compasses are generally similar in dimension and style, and both are approximately the same size and design, which was typical for compasses used for surveying. There are a few differences; Dupee’s compass is made of wood, which was more common in surveyor’s equipment. Greenough’s compass is made of brass, though he regularly worked with wood as well. Dupee’s wooden compass also has extensions at either end of the compass face that were useful in surveying to extend the North/South Axis when measuring angles, a feature Greenough’s compass lacks. Both men worked in Boston in the mid-1700s, and while Greenough was younger, they were contemporaries and worked in Boston during overlapping periods.

Deacon Thomas Greenough (born 1710) and his son, incidentally also named Thomas Greenough, produced a number of mechanical devices used for sea travel, navigation and surveying land. Both Greenough men worked making compasses and would label them, as our piece has been, with their name “T. Greenough,” though without a designation for Junior/Senior it is not easy to determine whether our piece was created by the father or son. Thomas Greenough, Senior was a Patriot and served on a Committee of Correspondence in the years leading up to the American Revolution in Boston. He died in 1785 and is buried at Copp’s Hill Burial ground in downtown Boston.

John Dupee’s life is not quite as well-documented. His shop was established in Boston in the early 1700s and only a few of his pieces still survive. Though the exact details of many parts of his life remain unknown a small part of his life’s story has survived. Born in France under the name Jean Dupuis, he fled France as a Huguenot refugee to Boston as many other Protestant Frenchmen were doing at the time, including Paul Revere’s father. Upon arriving in Boston Dupee anglicized his name. He married and had several children before his death in 1743. On his compass the arrow pointing north is marked with a Fleur de Lis, possibly an imported French style and possibly a nod to the maker’s birthplace.Around the face of the compass is also a maker’s mark giving credit to John Dupee along with rather odd instructions on where to find his shop. The Inscription reads “Made & Sold by John Dupee, North Side Swing Bridge Boston NE”. In a time before most businesses had individual addresses, they were instead referred to based on land marks or by an image on a sign that hung outside.

The Dupee compass is currently on display at the Historical Society’s museum. The Greenough compass can be seen by scheduling an appointment with me here at the Historical Society. For more information about Thomas Greenough, John Dupee or any of the other exciting pieces in our collection, feel free to send me an email at curator@natickhistoricalsociety.org