Circular piercework salt cellar or dish holder having a seamed, dot-and-dash-patterned frame to which are attached three, straight tapered, fluted legs and pendant floral swags held up by a central tassel. Exterior of each leg is struck with a different mark, a circle with Minerva head in profile facing left with "P" in helmet, a raised gothic or Old English "F" in a circle, and a lion passant facing right above "2" in an elongated hexagon, which is partially overstruck at end near bottom with a tiny key. No maker's mark seen.
Double-sided, rectangular stamp box with two snap-closure lids hinged at opposite edges; one lid features a repousse genre scene or vignette of an unruly classroom and the other a stamped symmetrical design of foliate scrolls and five rosettes on a crosshatched ground. Slanted interior plate is divided into three equal sections on both sides. Single sword mark at one end of both lids. Box is stamped on one end "HOLLAND" in incuse sans serif letters at corner diagonal from three partial marks, a letter, shield and imperial crown; opposite end has single sword overstruck with key and is incised "318578" along one short edge.
Antoni Van Leeuwenhoek (1635-1723) was a Dutch tradesman who became interested in microscopy while on a visit to London in 1666. Returning home, he began making simple microscopes of the sort that Robert Hooke had described in his, Micrographia, and using them to discover objects invisible to the naked eye.
In 1886, John Mayall, a prominent English microscopist, made drawings of an original Leeuwenhoek microscope that belonged to the Zoological Laboratories at the University of Utrecht, and that a Dutch professor had brought to London. Replicas followed soon thereafter. The Smithsonian purchased this example from the Rijksmuseum voor de Geschiedenis der Natuurwetenschappen in Leiden. The inscription reads “COPIE / LEIDEN.”
Ref: J. Mayall, “Leeuwenhoek’s Microscopes,” Journal of the Royal Microscopical Society 6 (1886): 1047-1049.
J. van Zuylen, “The Microscopes of Antoni van Leeuwenhoek,” Journal of Microscopy 121 (1981): 309-328.