The London Cup

This cup and cover was presented to the ship builder Jonas Shish to commemorate the launching of the warship HMS London on 26 June 1670. The ship, previously known as the Loyal London, had been burnt by the Dutch on the River Medway in 1667. It had been paid for by a loan of £100,000 from the City of London. Shish rebuilt the original ship at Deptford Dockyard where he was Master Shipwright. When the City of London refused to provide further funding for the repairs, Charles II removed the word 'Loyal' from the ship's name in response. The diarist John Evelyn was a pall bearer at Jonas Shish's funeral in 1680. He described him as 'an honest and remarkable man...and his death a public losse, for his excellent successe in building ships.'

The cover is hallmarked 1670. Although the cup and the cover bear the same date letter, and the pattern is the same throughout, the embossing on the cover is less finely executed than that on the cup itself. The small figure in classical armour which surmounts the cover has a damaged right arm and spear, and was probably added as a substitute for an earlier finial. At some period in the 19th century, the crest and arms of the family of Croft of Croft Castle have been added to the cover, and the initial C on the shield of the figure was probably engraved at the same time.