William IV silver wine funnel

A silver wine funnel is a useful and decorative wine accessory and will make decanting your fine red a much more enjoyable experience. This particular silver wine funnel is decorated with a French gadroon pattern border and a scallop shell cast mount. The wine funnel bowl is decoratively pierced and the funnel has a silver ring to hold a piece of muslin in place.

First appearing at the end of the 17th century, silver wine funnels or wine strainers were used to decant wine from the bottle to a decanter for the table. Examples from that early period are very rare and most antique wine funnels date from between 1770 and 1830.

The bowl was pierced with holes for catching larger pieces of detritus such as cork, while a retaining ring kept a piece of muslin straining cloth in place which filtered out finer sediment and prevented spoiling the wine in the decanter.

In the 18th century the spigot was crafted with a curved tip to ensure the wine ran gently down the wall of the decanter and, particularly for very fine or old wines, prevent bruising or clouding the wine.