Cane

Walking sticks or canes, writes Catherine Dike, 'were not intended to be leaned on. They were not physical supports and crutches. On the other hand they were psychological supports. They were an extension of the arm. They gave the owner an elegant air. He could swagger and swing his walking stick to the rhythm of his pace. He could pose and posture with it. He could challenge, defy, flirt and command. In those days one did not carry a walking stick or use a walking stick, one "wore" a walking stick.' (Catherine Dike. Walking Sticks. Princes Risborough, Shire Album 256, 1990, p. 3).

The fashionable gentleman of about 1730 might have had a gold watch with case chased with mythological scenes, and a cane head and a snuff box chased in the same style. Figures scenes and scrollwork of the kind on this cane head are characteristic of London and German gold chasing of the 1720s and 1730s. It is sometimes not straightforward to differentiate London from German work because London attracted notable gold chasers from Augsburg. They worked particularly on cases for London watches which at that date were pre-eminent in Europe. A watchcase chased with the same scene of Venus and Adonis is signed by Henry Manly who worked in London from about the 1720s to the late 1760s. As Heinrich Mannlich, he had been born into a distinguished family of goldsmiths in Augsburg where he was baptised in January 1698.

It is possible that one indication that this cane head was executed in Germany rather than London is that the use of varicoloured gold was rare in London. Some of the foliage and clothing is of a lighter colour gold (possibly a very light green) rather than the rich yellow of most of the gold.