The engraving on this salver has long been noted for its remarkable quality and exceptional condition. It is illustrated on page 8 of the "National Trust Book of English Domestic Silver" by Timothy Schroder.

The arms are those of Lethieullier impaling Salkeld for William Lethieullier (1672-1743) and his second wife Mary Salkeld (1656-?), whom he married in 1719.

William’s father, Sir John Lethieullier, had married Ann, daughter of Sir William Hooker, after whom William was named. The great diarist Samuel Pepys was not complimentary to Hooker who, he complained, “keeps the poorest, mean, dirty table in a dirty house that ever I did see any Sheriff of London, and a plain, ordinary, silly man I think he is, but rich.” But he goes on to say, “Only his son, Mr Lethieuillier, I like for a pretty, civil, understanding merchant, and — the more by much — because he happens to be husband to our noble, fat, brave lady [Ann] in our parish that my wife and I admire so.” John Lethieullier was elected Sheriff of London in 1674, knighted that same year, and was an influential member of the Old East India Company.

William’s son, Colonel William Lethieullier, F.A.S., was celebrated as an Egyptian traveler and collector of curiosities, and dying in 1756, bequeathed to the British Museum “a very perfect mummy” and a curious collection of English antiquities.

A pair of Chinese armorial plates of circa 1724 with these same arms was sold at Christie's, 9 April 2019, lot 29.

Salver