Plate

Pewter plate, the rim struck with Arms on a Bend three fish naient charged with a mullet (ie. a star). There is a very faint touch underneath depicting a male bust, profile to left flanked by the leters ‘W’ and ‘M’ in a shield-shaped frame. See also 87.127/17.

The only Arms which seem to concur with those on the plate are those of a Devon family which had a junior branch living in London during the sixteenth century. At the Visitation of London of 1568 a short pedigree of Hewes [Huish] was recorded thus: ‘James Hewes [Huish] gentleman citizen and grocer of London third son of John married to his first wife Margaret…’ The Arms recorded with this pedigree are Argent on a Bend Sable three Fish naient Argent finned and tailed Or with a Mullet Gules with the Crest on a Wreath Argent and Sable an Elephant’s Head couped Azure bezanty tusked Or eared and ducally crowned Argent charged with a Mullet Or. The mantling is Gules doubled Argents (College of Arms, G10 396 and 2C22, 2986). The London branch of the family used a mullet, the cadency mark of a third son, as a mark of difference. It is possible that the plate was originally marked with the Arms for James Huish, but it could also have been made for either of his sons, who might have used the mullet to indicate that they came from a branch of the family lthat was descended from a third son rather than indicating that they were third sons themselves. In the published indices to the PCC wills for 1590 there was a ‘James Huishe, citizen and grocer of London, in the parish of St Pancras; Southbrente, Somerset; Sidburie, Devon; Shepperton, Middlesex; Surrey; Essex’: presumably the owner, or father of the owner of the plate.