Teapot

As with the Hurd and Edwards families, John Burt and his three sons, Samuel, William, and Benjamin, formed a multigenerational silversmithing dynasty in colonial Boston. Samuel, the eldest, fashioned an impressive amount of silver during his brief career.

Burt would have just finished his apprenticeship at the time of his father’s death in 1745. He probably ran the workshop after that date while completing the training of his younger brothers. A wide range of hollowware among Samuel’s three dozen known works demonstrates his full mastery of his father’s skills. Nearly one-third of Samuel’s silver is in the Museum’s collection, including this teapot and another (cat. no. 23), the only known examples of this form to survive with his mark.

Both teapots are of the globular apple form popular during the early and mid-eighteenth century and resemble those produced by his father. Samuel may have used the molds in his father’s shop, for the faceted scalloped spout appears to be the same as that used by John Burt. The spout’s similarity to examples by Jacob Hurd and Josiah Austin, among others, may point to the existence of one shop that provided spouts and other cast elements for craftsmen in the close-knit Boston silversmithing community. Since the forms of both teapots are nearly identical — they are distinguished solely by their engraving — they demonstrate the choices made by patrons willing to pay for this additional decoration.

This text has been adapted from "Silver of the Americas, 1600-2000," edited by Jeannine Falino and Gerald W.R. Ward, published in 2008 by the MFA. Complete references can be found in that publication.