The star of this week's Metalware section is an antique copper samovar by the St. Petersburg factory Dubinin.
Almost three hundred people are currently following the lot, and the price has already soared from 1 hryvnia to 100 thousand as a result of 30 bids.
The height of the vessel is 48 centimeters and it is designed to hold 5 liters of liquid.
By the way, last summer, a similarly designed 7-liter samovar from the same manufacturer with a height of 55 centimeters was valued at 41203 hryvnias. The competition then also turned out to be fierce - 78 bids were made during the auction.
The age of an artifact can be more or less accurately determined by the maker's mark, which partly explains its value.
The overlay silver factory of the St. Petersburg merchant of the Third Guild Dubinin was founded in the 1840s and operated only until the 1870s. The company produced trays, kitchen utensils, candlesticks, and other interior decorations, but samovars were the most popular among the factory's assortment.
The use of overlay silver, which was very fashionable in England and France in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, later found its way to the Russian market. There, in the middle of the century before last, it was embodied in the decoration of samovars. Applying a thin silver foil to red copper made it possible to make dishes that looked like silver, but were several times cheaper.
This technology called "cladding" was developed in ancient Rome. In fact, devices for boiling water also originate from antiquity.
Ancient Greek autopsy (αὐθέψης, literally "self-heater") for heating water. 3rd century AD
imj.org.il
Ancient Roman autepsis. First century AD, bronze
invaluable.com
