Obj. ID: 35771
Sacred and Ritual Objects  Kiddush cup, Safed, 1881

The following description was prepared by William Gross:

This so-called "Zfat Cup" is a well known and popular item of Judaica. Most of these cups were brought without decoration from Europe, as indicated by the silver hallmarks, and were engraved in Eretz Israel with vignettes of Holy sites. The common knowledge is that such cups were fashioned the city of Safed and hence their common name. The earliest dated cup is from 1881, so it is probable that they were made in the last quarter of the 19th century and the first quarter of the 20th. A number of existing examples have personal dedications, but it seems that they were purchased as souvenirs of the Holy Land as well.

Most of them, of the later types, carry an almost identical design, but the earlier examples, among which this is numbered, showed more original variation. This cup is the earliest dated example known. It carries a personalized dedicatory inscription in a shield above the image of the Tomb of Rachel, in itself unusual for this genre, as opposed to other dedicated examples in which the inscriptions are around the upper rim. The other Holy sites depicted are the Tomb of Samuel the Prophet, the Kotel, and the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron.

Inscription: ELIYAHU TZVI , SON OF SHMUEL LEIB, FROM THE HOLY CITY OF JERUSALEM, MAY IT BE BUILT AND ESTABLISHED SPEEDILY IN OUR TIME, AMEN. THE YEAR 5641(1881)