Furniture, Works of Art & Clocks - 5th July 2017
Lot 66
λ A rare mid-18th century Anglo-American map powder horn
Estimate £800 - £1,200 | Hammer £4000
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Description
λ A rare mid-18th century Anglo-American map powder horn, scrimshaw decorated with a harbour, sailing ships and major settlements and forts, including: New York and Albany and with trade routes leading north to the Canadian lakes including the 'Hudson-Lake Champlain' route, also decorated with a compass, the British Royal Coat of Arms and a double banner indistinctly inscribed and possibly dated, 21cm long.
In Colonial and Revolutionary times soldiers and hunters had to travel through unfamiliar lands and much of the region was unchartered with no maps. So it became common practice for well-known trade routes to be engraved on cow or ox horns. The powder horn such an important companion, then served a dual-purpose, to carry gun powder and to act as a guide.
See Stephen Grancsay, American Engraved Powder Horns, A Study based on the J. H. Grenville Gilbert Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, for a full discussion of engraved powder horns and for similar examples, cat. nos. 28,29,30.