Teapot 1782

This drum-shaped teapot represents a transition to the Neoclassical style. It is one of five surviving Boston examples of this type, all made in the Revere shop. The oval-shaped teapots so characteristic of Revere's post-Revolutionary War production were made from rolled sheet silver seamed at the handle. The drum-shaped bodies, however, were hammered up from a single disk of silver. Neoclassical styling is evident in the straight reeded spout and handle sockets of this pot and in the cast pinecone finial. The monogram "S I B," engraved on the body in intertwined script, is that of Stephen and Isannah (Hichborn) Bruce, who were married at Kings Chapel in Boston in the autumn of 1776. Isannah (b. 1754) was a cousin of Revere. The teapot descended in the family until 1969, when it was donated to the Museum.