On Reckoning with Games of Chance in the Dutch Republic

Abstract

This article examines a distinctive type of drinking vessel that was produced in early modern northern Europe known as a ‘somersault cup’ or ‘drink-up’. Lacking a proper base, such beakers had to be emptied of their intoxicating contents before they could rest, inverted, on their rims. These cups clearly lent themselves to hazardous drinking games. The author considers how the confrontation with chance in these drinking vessels broadly pertains to managing the hazards of maritime vessels. She focuses on the implications of dice glasses, which incorporate a single die, in the Dutch Republic circa 1580–1700. The advent of the dice vessels coincides with the Republic's ascendancy as a global mercantile and maritime power. These glasses were produced just as uncertain futures were increasingly subjected to reasoned calculation, particularly in the growing marine insurance industry. Dice glasses suggest complex relationships between numbers and material things in early constructions of risk and future uncertainty.