A GEORGE II SILVER-MOUNTED LIGNUM VITAE WASSAIL BOWL

The arms are those of Delmar impaling Abbot for William Delmar (1786 - 1867) and his wife Emma, second daughter of John Abbot, whom he married in 1811. William Delmar was educated at St. John's College, Cambridge, and was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in 1808. He was both a Justice of the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant of Kent.

Wassail bowls, typically made in the 17th and early 18th Centuries, derive their name from the Anglo-Saxon 'Waes-hael', equivalent to 'Good health'. Though they have been particularly associated with Christmas festivities, wassailing ceremonies were held at other times of the year. The introduction of Lignum vitae in the late 16th Century allowed bowls of far greater size to be easily turned than had generally been the case with English woods, and while generally turned with a stem and foot, examples without are not uncommon. A bowl similar to the Sainsbury example is illustrated in Jonathan Levi, Treen for the table, Woodbridge, 1998, p. 21, plate 1/8. Edward H. Pinto, in Treen and other Wooden Bygones, London, 1969, notes that monteiths made in wood are relatively rare.