Tea Caddy

Decorated with an image known as the “Provender for the Monastery,” this tea caddy reflects the politics of mid-eighteenth century Great Britain. In the satiric scene, a Catholic monk attempts to smuggle a woman into his abbey. The woman’s face and feet can be seen within the bundle of stalks strapped to the man’s back. By this time, the Church of England had imposed an array of penal laws designed to erode the faith of British Catholics. Though this object was made in China, the image upon the caddy was first published in 1742, in a London broadsheet that supported anti-Jacobite and anti-Catholic attitudes.