Objects
Box- tobacco
Nicotine
Consumption
Tobacco consumption
[Taken from catalogue entry]
A brass tobacco or snuff box, dated 1724. The oblong canted body with latched lid cast with a portrait medallion, the reverse with a tree within laurel branches. The sides inscribed. This highly personalized box, with name, date, occupation and portrait, was possibly a gift.
Inscription:
[Side] John Butler Wheelwright
[Opposite side] In Cranborn Dorset 1724
The use of tobacco was inspired by indigenous Americans. The plant was brought back to Europe by European explorers in the sixteenth century, when it was prized for both its medicinal and narcotic properties.
Pipe smoking was the oldest and most common way of taking tobacco (or ‘drinking tobacco ’ as it was sometimes called). The practice of taking snuff only became popular in Britain when Charles II brought the custom back from his exile in France. Boxes to contain pipe tobacco and snuff were made in their thousands. Decoration varied from the finest jeweled examples in gold and silver, to more modest boxes in carved or painted wood, brass and tin.
Production
Dates of Production: 1724
England
Consumer
John Butler
male
Wheelwright
Consumption
Cranborne, Dorset, England
Materials
Metal- brass
Metal- latten
Museological Details
Snuff box
Crab Tree Farm
D.O.M/82
This image is subject to copyright. The holding collection has given permission to reproduce this image on this website.