Moscow Kremlin Museums:

Tableware

Children's blowing horn
The Moscow Kremlin workshops, XVIIth century.
Silver, embossing, engraving, gilding
Loving cup (bratina)
Russia, Moscow, first half of the XVIIth century.
Silver, engraving, embossing, chiselling.
Toy coffeepot
Holland, Amsterdam.
Silver, casting, embossing.
Tankard with a flap lid
Germany, Augsburg.
Silver, glass, casting, chasing, etching.
Quaich
Russia, Moscow, 1636.
Gold, precious stones, rock crystal, engraving, niello, enamel.
Granted to Tsarevich Ivan by his mother, Tsarina Eudokia Lukianovna, the second wife of Mikhail Fyodorovich.
Beaker
Russia, second half of the XVIIth century.
Silver, carving.
Saltcellar
Russia, Moscow, first half of the XVIIIth century.
Silver, casting, embossing.
Belonged to Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich.
Ewer from the washbasin set
Turkey, Istanbul, the XVIIth century.
Gold, precious stones, casting, enamel, chasing.
Basin from the washbasin set
Turkey, Istanbul, the XVIIth century.
Gold, precious stones, casting, enamel, chasing.

Precious personal pieces of tableware were common belongings of each member of the Tsar’s family. They serve as interior decorations as well. Dishware and cutlery of young Tsareviches and Tsarevnas were placed in special cupboard-dresser "postavets": sometimes vessels were executed in various forms of birds and animals, which amused both adults and children.

Tableware of Tsar’s children, was presented to them as gifts or handed down as an inheritance. These gifts were brought to newborn children by officials and public individuals, from the very sovereign and members of his family to the nobility and common tradespeople. Having been collected for several years gifts formed a special treasury which belonged to a child; sometimes they were inherited by other relatives in accordance with parents’ desire.

Precious tableware was intended to be used as kitchen implements but, sometimes, as toys or curious interior decorations.

It could have played a role of church utensil during sacral ceremonies, for example, funeral. Filled with water or food, vessels were placed on a coffin to accompany symbolically the departed. For example, a silver loving-cup (pic.2), executed in commemoration of the Tsar Mikhail Fyodorovich's daughter, who died at a very young age.

The exposition presents the cup of Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich (1554-1582), the second son of Ivan the Terrible and Anastasia Romanovna, the quaich of Tsarevich Ivan Mikhailovich (1633-1639), the son of Tsar Mikhail Fyodorovich and his wife Eudokia Lukianovna, beaker of Tsarevich Alexei Alexeevich (1654-1670), the son of Tsar Alexis Mikhailovich and Maria Ilyinichna Miloslavskaya, saltcellar and the washbasin set of Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich ( 1690-1718), the son of Peter I and Eudokia Fyodorovna Lopukhina.