Adobe Gallery Blog
Subject: Silver Navajo Spoon with Feather-design Handle
This elaborately decorated silver spoon features a feather-pattern handle and a stamped bowl of elaborate symbols. It dates to circa 1900. Spoons such as this appeared in pamphlets and catalogs of Navajo traders as early as 1902 and possibly earlier. Traders such as Lorenzo Hubbell, C. N. Cotton, and J. B. Moore featured them. Moore advertised them at $1.50 per oz.
The fascination with Navajo-made silver spoons waned around 1915. Navajo smiths switched from making souvenir spoons to making, on special order, complete table service silver.
This spoon comes with a specially-made display stand that permits the spoon to be displayed in a frontal view.
Condition: original condition
Provenance: Medicine Man Gallery, Santa Fe
private Virginia family collection
Recommended Reading; Navajo Spoons: Indian Artistry and the Souvenir Trade, 1880s - 1940s by Cindra Kline
Subject: Silver Navajo Spoon with Feather-design Handle
Unknown Maker
Category: Silverware
Origin: Diné - Navajo Nation
Medium: silver
Size: 6-1/8" long
Item # C3393C
