Footed Beaker
Venice or Façon de Venise, first half of the 16th century,
colourless glass, gold, gilding partially abraded
H 36,3 cm
Private collection
In many places in Europe, glass has been produced for everyday use or for representative purposes since ancient times. However, it appears that there was no single centre that was decisive for the development of production over a longer period of time. This changed in the second half of the 15th century at the latest: from that time until towards the end of the 17th century, Venice was the place that produced the glasses most highly valued in the whole of Europe and beyond. They were manufactured in a large number workshops on the island of Murano.
The clientele ranged from the upper middle classes to the highest ecclesiastical and secular dignitaries. Particularly sought-after products were naturally imitated by competing glassworks, copied or adapted to the tastes of the regional clientele. Such glasses are usually called Façon de Venise. The distinction between these and “authentic” products from Venice was, however, difficult or impossible even for contemporary glassmakers and glass traders, partly because Venetian glassmakers often emigrated despite the prohibitions against it.
Glasses known as “footed beakers” consist of three parts: a raised foot, a usually hollow nodus (knop) and a trumpet-shaped cuppa (bowl). They were obviously very popular and have been preserved in relatively large numbers. The English glass scholar Robert Charleston aptly called them “stately in appearance” – for which they may have been treated more carefully than “ordinary” drinking glasses.
For a long time, examples of the type shown here have mostly been attributed to the glassworks of Hall in Tyrol, Austria. This is probably inaccurate, as footed beakers in this style are already known from the years before 1534, when the glassworks in question started its activities, for example from depictions in Italian paintings from the 1520s. Venetian glassworks were certainly involved in the production, as evidenced by archaeological finds from the lagoon. The origin is therefore not in Hall – which does not mean that such glasses could not have been produced there, just as in other glassworks in Europe that worked à la façon de Venise.
Because the footed beaker style was so obviously popular, there are many extant examples in several variants. The pommel can be smooth, vertically ribbed, or lozenge patterned. The same is true for the cuppa, which sometimes evidences a hobnail pattern. In addition there are examples with gilding – especially on the knop – as well as painted bowls and, rarely, feet. The footed beaker shown here is unusually large in size at 36 cm. Comparative examples with a similar construction are normally between 16 and 20 cm high.