A Kütahya lemon-squeezer, Turkey, mid-18th century

a small bowl with everted rim and central rounded boss with vertical facets, with four holes at the base, inside the boss a cylindrical trap leading to an aperture at the base, the cavetto decorated with underglaze cobalt blue with four floral sprays alternating with rosettes, narrow bands of hatching and foliate forms along the boss facets, the outside decorated with a wide band of bouquets

This delightful and rare object would have been used to extract lemon juice for sherbet.  Water, honey and lemon cooled with ice and flavoured with musk and ambergris was a popular refreshment during the Ottoman period.  The central trap allows juice to be squeezed until the bowl is almost full, when the trap breaks the juice rushes out of the base.

For a further discussion on the subject see John Carswell, 'The Lemon Squeezer; an unique form of Turkish Pottery', IVeme Congres International d'Art Turc, 1971, Aix-en-Provence, 1976.

A lemon squeezer with similar decoration was sold through these rooms 12 April 1989, lot 14.  Other lemon squeezers are published in Akalin and Bilgi 1997, p.59, Soustiel 2000, no.84, and Carswell 1991, no.K132.