# Nautilus Cup [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [UNKNOWN GOLDSMITH, German]() - Date: 1651-1700 - Technique: Partially gilt silver, embossed, cast, engraved, nautilus shell, height 42 cm ## Commentary The ornamental cups which incorporate the widely diverse hard shell of rare and exotic Cephalopods, the Nautiloidea \(native to the south-western part of the Pacific, the Indian Ocean\) were popular items of the cabinets of curiosities in the seventeenth century. Known since the Middle Ages, the mounting of the nautilus shell reached its efflorescence in the period from the last third of the sixteenth to the first half of the seventeenth century, culminating around the 1600s. The present ornate cup was produced by Georg Pfeilsticker \(c. 1626-1676\), a notable silversmith in Nuremberg. ## Related artworks - [Agraffe with a Depiction of the Virgin and Saints]() - [Altar frontal]() - [Amulet]() - [Arm reliquary of St Lawrence]() - [Arm Reliquary]() - [Book cover]() - [Book Cover]() - [Book Cover]() - [Book cover]() - [Book Cover]() - [Bust reliquary of Charlemagne]() - [Candelabra with seven arms]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()