Lot Details
Lot 82
Chinese Silver Presentation Box with Russian Inscriptions
Circa 1917
Rectangular, the sides and hinged cover repoussé and chased with Chinese dragons, the cover centering the Cyrillic monogram SVL above the dates 1877 1917 and the Russian inscription Kitai Khankou [China Hankou], with applied Cyrillic facsimile signatures. Height 3 1/8 inches (7.9 cm.), width 9 1/2 inches (24 cm.), depth 5 1/2 inches (14 cm.), approximately 36.75 ounces (1,174 grams).
The Russian colony in Hankou was one of the first in China. In the second half of the nineteenth century, Russian merchants began to settle in this large trading port, where tea was delivered from the plantations of the great river basin. The name "Hankou" was widely recognizable throughout pre-revolutionary Russia from the printing on tea packaging.
Shortly after Emperor Nicholas II ascended the throne in 1896, a trade concession agreement was signed. One of the largest tea enterprises, established in Hankou in 1873, was the S.V. Litvinov & Co. factory, run by Semyon Vasilyevich Litvinov and his wife Elizaveta Nikolaevna. Semyon and Elizaveta, who was known locally the "Russian Tsarina," enjoyed great wealth and influence in city.
The monogram "SVL" on the present box is most likely that of Semyon Vasilyevich Litvinov. The dates of 1877-1917 suggest an important 40-year anniversary.
C
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