Polished English agate snuff box (above).
with fine, 10-carat gold foliage, c1730
1st Dibs
As Britain got hooked on tobacco, smoking paraphernalia cropped up quickly. Items such as tobacco boxes provide an insight into the anxieties and aspirations of the early modern psyche. Even the clay pipe, light and tobacco could be bought in an ale-house, tavern or coffee house. Personalised tobacco boxes soon became an indispensable accessory for the British smoker. They were noted in printed literature from the early C17th and later in wills.
Smoking and snuffing developed in own elaborate ritual that involved sharing and borrowing. Socialised smoking in alehouses became common but, by the late 1600s, lighting a pipe with a friend at home had also became a ritualised social practice. This sociable smoking helped friends build up a close, mutual familiarity.
Anxieties around loss did not end with the obligation to share in convivial company: tobacco boxes were the first thing thieves looked for, as criminal court records stated. Plus there was another sign: many men wore their tobacco box very close to the body. In 1711 a man advertised for his lost ivory-enamel snuff box offering half a guinea reward!
Even items bought off the shelf, complete with general messages, were then personalised with inscriptions & initials. Once personalised, even the humblest boxes revealed a great deal about an owner’s life, personality, interests, social relationships and trade. A Scottish black-smith had his name, trade and town proudly inscribed on his 1726 tobacco box, celebrating his apprenticeship's end.
Like alcohol, tobacco developed its own literary presence. There were many celebrity smokers, including philosopher Thomas Hobbes and scientist Isaac Newton who argued that smoking helped their creativity. The poet George Daniel declared tobacco a Nursing Fame, while Samuel Rowlands needed a continuous supply of tobacco to perfume his writing brain. Book-shaped boxes became especially popular in the C18th, drawing attention to their owners’ bookish interests or to their profession. In 1725 a lawyer and the auditor for Norwich Cathedral, had a brass box that was shaped like a book with elaborate calligraphy on the covers.
Dutch silver book-shaped tobacco box and cover
Marks of schoonhoven, c1793
Boxes were often decorated in ways that advertised their owner’s social status, especially a coat of arms. During the herald’s visit to London in 1687, eight men brought silver tobacco boxes as evidence of their family’s standing. Those who could only aspire to arms would make up a design and have it applied to tobacco boxes.
And boxes were ideal for the display of royal arms or portraits that expressed a smoker’s allegiances. To facilitate loyal smoking, the printmaker Peter Stent sold small prints of royalty and other nobility to adorn tobacco boxes. In celebration of Charles II’s coronation in 1661, for example, a special image was developed.
Silver tobacco box, oval and with hinged lids.
Francis Harache, London c1755,
crest and arms of William Wither.
Francis Harache, London c1755,
crest and arms of William Wither.
Though the Church never expressly encouraged tobacco, some tobacco boxes lauded the anxieties of Protestantism over the impermanence of human life and the uncertainty of salvation. One brass box was inscribed on one side with a relevant verse from Proverbs. The inscription emphasised the comfort of family and the simple pleasures of a happy Protestant life. At 18 John Pinder attended Cambridge then started his clerical career as a deacon in York. He celebrated his homecoming by adding the date, name and diocese on a secondhand brass tobacco box.
Personal tobacco boxes could be used as a mirror, a perpetual calendar, for carrying letters. Sometimes they were totally readapted eg brass boxes could be converted into a pounce pot used by calligraphers to dry ink. Tobacco boxes were also family heirlooms and memorials. In 1713, Henry Monck presented his well-known horn box, bought at the local Horn Fair, to the members of the convivial Past Overseers Society, of which he was a founder. He shared its contents with co-members at every tavern meeting.
Tortoiseshell double pipe case with silver mounts,
and snuff box early C18th, 24 cm.
The stopper/rammer was another essential piece of equipment, coming in a variety of materials and often taking a figurative form of relevance to their original owner. And the tobacco pipe case which was smoker’s pocket-case for holding a short meerschaum or clay pipe. Remember the clay tobacco pipe was popular for a couple of centuries, so many of the pipe cases were wonderful examples of craftsmanship, made from fruitwood, silver, tortoiseshell, boxwood or even leather. By the late C18th, ALL tobacco equipment clearly provided a canvas to make statements of identity, allowing us to better understand status and social practices around tobacco objects.
Snuff box of King Frederick II, c1770,