Antique French Silver-Plate Gigot Holder and Marrow Scoop Set

Two pieces of antique French serveware, found together at a brocante and used and displayed for decades at Patricia and Walter Wells's Paris apartment. Patricia explains that each was made for a specific purpose: one for gigot — roast leg of lamb — and one for serving marrow. The gigot holder is a compact silver-plate vessel in the form of a baluster vase, engraved with fine floral and foliate motifs and fitted with a small oval thumb piece designed to grip the bone of the leg while carving. The marrow scoop is slender silver-plate with a creamy bone handle, its collar finished with reeded detailing where handle meets stem. Displayed together on a shelf or sideboard they make a considered still life; brought to the table for a Sunday gigot or a pot-au-feu, they bring exactly the kind of pleasure that Patricia and Walter's Paris table has always been known for.