Georgian 18k 2.90 CTW Agate, Bloodstone Intaglio & Secret Hair Locket Mourning Fob for Welsh Baronet with Royal Tudor, Stuart & Shakespeare History

General Information:

• Total Carat Weight: 2.90 ctw
• Precious Metal Weight: 3.86 dwt (estimated)
• Precious Metal Material: 18k yellow gold body with 14k yellow gold escutcheon-shaped bow (the top loop)
• Dimensions: This fob measures 24.92 mm overall. The lower agate-studded body below the bow and measures exactly 13 mm north to south, while the intaglio-bezeled base measures 13.99 mm long x 12.31 mm wide overall.
• Weight: A wonderfully weighty and exact 6.00 grams
• Markings: When opened, the upper opening's mounting is hand-inscribed with "My Dear Husband’s Hair Obt. 14 Feby. 1835.", and the space below the glazed crystal hair locket bears a hand-inscribed set of initials belonging to the departed, "T.R.S." The intaglio adorning the base depicts the arms of the widow of the baronet Sir Thomas Robert Salusbury, 2nd Baronet of Llanwern (Newport, South East Wales). The widow whom the arms represent and for whom the fob was fabricated was Dame Elizabeth Mary Salusbury (née Burroughs).
• Era: his fob dates to at least 1835, perhaps dating to a few years prior and subsequently purchased and inscribed to honor the deceased by his loving wife, who was a heraldic heiress.
• Buyer Notes: This piece is unimaginably rare, with virtually no exact comparables on the open market at the time of listing. However, a very close comparable was sold in the first few months of 2022 by the highly revered dealer Alex Alfieri of Manchester-based Butterlane Antiques. We invite prospective buyers to check out an Instagram post featuring Mr. Alfieri's comparable fob here, which is dated June 1853, and honors a mother and son, Sarah and Ralph Bates of Northumberland, England.  Both fobs share stylistic similarities which may possibly be explained by their UK-regional origins. Though there may be more fobs of this unique make within family private collections, these two are the only fobs of their kind known-- for certain-- to exist!

Specifications:

• Center Stone Type: Bloodstone (also known as heliotrope; bloodstone is a cryptocrystalline quartz (variety of chalcedony) 
• Center Stone Count: One (1)
• Center Stone Dimensions: 12.25 x 10.50 x 1.90 mm
• Center Stone Carat Weight: 1.65 ct
• Center Stone Shape: Cut corner rectangular tablet cabochon with hand-carved intaglio seal
• Center Stone Color: Bloodstone is comprised of dark green jasper with red iron oxide and/or hematite inclusions
• Center Stone Clarity: Opaque

• Side Stone Type: Banded agate (chalcedony; perpendicularly sliced "bull's eye" agate)
• Side Stone Count: Four (4)
• Side Stone Carat Weight: 1 ctw; 0.25 ct ea.
• Side Stone Dimensions: 6.15 x 4.50 x 1.25 mm, on average between the four stones
• Side Stone Shape: Arched rectangular tablet cabochon
• Side Stone Color: Black to brown with whitish vertical stripe(s)
• Side Stone Clarity: Semi-translucent to opaque

• Side Stone Type: Clear Crystal Quartz
• Side Stone Count: One (1)
• Side Stone Carat Weight: 0.25 ct
• Side Stone Dimensions: 5.35 x 4.15 x 1.55 mm, approximate as measured within bezeled mounting
• Side Stone Shape: Beveled cushion rectangular tablet
• Side Stone Color: Colorless with optical phenomenon causing adularescence (rainbow effect on cut bezel when viewed in particular angles)
• Side Stone Clarity: Transparent; this glazed compartment holds human hair and so acts as an alternative to a window of glass

The Story:

This fob is an exceptional museum-quality mourning jewel, and though an expression of unimaginable grief and the heartbreak of sudden loss, also boasts baronetage status with direct connections to royal English figures, including the House of Tudor's first monarch King Henry VII (1457-1509), King Henry VIII (1491-1547), King Edward VI (1537-1553), and last monarch Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603), the House of Stuart's King Charles I (1600-1649), and even William Shakespeare (1564-1616) himself!

This fob commemorates the life of Sir Thomas Robert Salusbury, 2nd Baronet of Llanwern in Monmouth County, Newport, South East Wales, who died unexpectedly during a riding accident on Valentine's Day, February 14, 1835. It was created for his wife, Dame Elizabeth Mary Salusbury (née Burroughs), late of Offley Place in the Parish of Offley, Hertford County, as a memento of remembrance of her lost love. The pair married rather later in life, he at 50 and she at 40, on October 1, 1833, and neither had been previously wed. The riding accident occured only 501 days into their marriage (one year, four months and two weeks), and Sir T.R.S. Bt., perished with no heirs to claim his title, automatically passing his baronetcy to his younger brother, Sir Charles John Salusbury (1792-1868), and having died without a male heir, the baronetcy died with him.

On their paternal side, the Sirs T.R.S. and C.J. Salusbury, Bts. are descendants of the famed noblewoman Katheryn Of Berain (sometimes spelled Catherine, and also known as Katheryn Tudor), an ancestress of many great Welsh families causing history to dub her "Mam Cymru" or "Mother of Wales". She was a cousin of Queen Elizabeth the I, and was married four times during her life. One of her sons, Sir John Salusbury of Llewenni married Ursula, daughter of Henry Stanley, 4th Earl of Derby in 1585, and it was the enamored love between this couple that is believed to have inspired William Shakespeare's "The Phœnix and the Turtle", an allegorical poem describing the death of the most ideal kind of love. In 1619, Katheryn Of Berain's grandson, Sir Henry Salusbury was the first to be granted the title of baronet, and thus began the legacy of the Salusbury Baronetcy in the Baronetage of England. This was not, however, the first time that the Salusbury family was honored with titles and the prestige of courtly connections: 15th-16th century Salusbury ancestors were loyal to the royals, and were knighted by King Edward VI, King Henry VII, and Queen Elizabeth I, known to be steadfast agents to King Henry VIII, and many also served as Members of Parliament, were stewards of lordships, and achieved ranks as high constables and sheriffs, and loyal subjects to Charles I during his reign, among numerous other noteworthy roles.

It was not until 1795, though, that the Salusbury Baronetcy of Llanwern was created, the appellation of first baronet bestowed to parliamentarian Sir Robert Salusbury of Llanwern of Cotton Hall (cousin of the Llewenis baronetcy which was extinct by 1684), who was the father of Sir T.R.S. Bt., whom this fob memorializes. Before the honoree inherited the baronet title, his father was bankrupt, and together, the father and son duo sold their portion of an enormous Salusbury property (one of the original owners of which was Anne Boleyn's great-grandmother, and which had  been conveyed to the Baronet in 1773) back to the trustees distant relatives who owned the rest of the land. The reluctant sale of this hereditary land was made in an attempt to clear some of Sir R.S., Bt.'s debts. Within a decade, Sir R.S., Bt. was a victim of conspiracy, and in 1816, was jailed in the King's Bench Prison for bankruptcy. By 1817, he died at Canterbury a penniless man. Upon his death, Sir T.R.S. Bt. became the 2nd Baronet of Llanwern, and inherited some familial lands and the inheritance, at that point a well accomplished barrister and scholar. He is reported to have expressed much regret for selling the family estate which had been in Salusbury hands for generations. Sixteen years after acquiring the baronet title, he married the original owner of this sentimental jewel.

Sir R.S., Bt. had five sons, the eldest having inherited the baronetcy and the second to youngest being the father of Dame E.M. Salusbury, named Rev. Lynch Salusbury Burroughs, making the Dame and Baronet first cousins. Though born a Salusbury, Rev. Burroughs assumed this new surname as an adult as part of an agreement to an old will of one of his ancestors. Most interestingly, the entirety of the family estate which Sirs R.S., Bt. and T.R.S. Bt. had so grievously sold resulted in an immediate conveyance of the property to the reverend. However, the land was placed under a longstanding tailmale, meaning no female descendant could legally inherit it. Therefore, even though she was the reverend's only surviving heir, the land conveyed to a distant relative, Lord Charles Ingoldsby Burroughs Paulet, 13th Marquess of Winchester, PC. So as to reclaim the Salusbury estate, Dame E.M.S. purchased it back from the Marquess relative, so that through her marriage to the Baronet, the family's estate could securely remain in the family once again even after the death of her husband, the 2nd Baronet.

Records show that the Dame never remarried and did not have children. Yet, she legally adopted a cousin of hers, Miss Anne Steward Salusbury, who later married Barrister George Edward Hughes and had many children together. Indeed, both the 1851 and 1861 census records list the whole Hughes clan-- including at least four sons, their two nurses and a governess-- as living with the Dame at her residence. These censuses also note several housekeepers, housekeeper's assistants, housemaids, butlers, lady's maids, footmen, a bookkeeper, a butterman and a coachman. She died on December 14, 1867 at her familial estate the Offley Place, her only heir her adopted daughter, Mrs. Anne S.S. Hughes. Her will was proved in 1869, and states that her effects and estate were worth the equivalent of $1,107,405 USD, per 1869 to 2022 inflation rates. The Hughes family inherited this sum and would have also inherited this fob. Somewhere along the course of time, the fob separated from the Hughes family, and passed through unknown hands and collections before finding a home in this shop.

The fob's base is mounted with a cut corner bloodstone intaglio that helps tell the familial histories of both the departed and the widow, as the arms depicted are actually a symbolic amalgamation of the Dame's inherited heraldic arms (inherited from her paternal side) and the Baronet's Salusbury arms: the Salusbury baronetcy coat of arms is overlaid with an "escutcheon of pretense", which indicates that the widow is an heir to her father's heraldry before and after the death of her husband. The blazon which describes the Salusbury arms is "Gules a Lion Rampant Argent ducally crowned or between three Crescents of the last".

The Symbolism:

The following breaks down the symbolic meanings behind each element of the Salusbury arms: 

1. The "mantle" foliate frame: usually reserved for royalty and represents sovereign power and meritorious achievements.
2. The "gules" vertical stripes: represents the color red and is associated with the heavenly body of Mars and the jewel, ruby. Both Mars and rubies represent passionate desire and ardent energy.
3. The uppermost "crest": comprising an English shield with a "sinister hand in the apaumé position", representing compassionate leadership and faith.
4. The "lion rampant": most often reserved for royalty; rampant describes the rearing position, readied with strength and courageous valor.
5. The "ducal crown": rests atop the lion rampant; represents victory and rank, as well as a closeness to God.
6. The "three crescents": represent guidance, enlightenment, graciousness and greater glory; the use of three suggests a nod to the Holy Trinity of the Christian faith.

The following breaks down the symbolic meanings behind the elements of the
Escutcheon Pretense, the central-most English shield shape that rests atop the lion rampant, which is indicative of the Dame's status as a heraldic heiress:

1. The "azure" horizontal stripes: represents the color blue and is associated with the heavenly body of Jupiter and the jewel, sapphire. Both Jupiter and sapphires represent perseverance and authority.
2. The diagonal "bend dexter" banner: represents an assembled and readied defense of family.
3. A pair of bees or butterflies: outermost emblems on the bend dexter; represents efficiency, industry, creativity, diligence as well as freedom of spirit and soul.
4. A central single rose: innermost emblem on the bend dexter; represents joyful hope; may be a reference to the Tudor Rose given the family's ancestral ties to the Tudor Dynasty.

The following offer additional symbolism imbued in the gemstone selection of this jewel:

1. Bloodstone heliotrope: represents divine protection and a courageous heart and relates to the undeserved grace gifted through Christ.
2. Banded agate chalcedony: represents an inexplicable peace, spiritual stability and holy abundance in times of loss.
3. Clear crystal quartz: represents emotional strength, mental clarity and heavenly awareness.

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