//
Description
This showy drinking vessel once enlivened the home of a family with Dutch heritage living near Hackensack, New Jersey. The inscription on the body boldly proclaims time’s passage, "WHEN THIS YOU SEE REMEMBER ME," but the memento mori message is seemingly at odds with the riotous bouquets of floral specimens in permanent bloom on the tankard sides and lid. The engraver depicted examples of non-native plants, such as tulips, possibly inspired by Dutch and English botanical prints or still life paintings. A large central wreath made by two flowering boughs frames the initials of the family’s progenitors, Joost Zabriskie and Cristina Mabie Zabriskie, with a commemorative date of 1728. The Zabriskies (Zaborisco/Zaborowskij) were one of dozens of early yeoman farmer families settled in the parish of the Dutch Reformed Church in Hackensack by the early 1700s. They intermarried with colonists from the region and across the Hudson River in Manhattan, where desirable imported goods like household pewter and textiles were available. The Zabriskies reared a large family including a daughter named Matilda (Magteltie) who was baptized on September 25, 1715. Her descendants inherited this tankard and an engraved fluted dish as part of their patrimony in pewter.