Sasieni Family Era (c.1935-39) Four Dot Buckingham Smooth Billiard Estate Briar Pipe, English Estates

Description

Along with names like Barling, Charatan, and Dunhill Sasieni holds a special place in the history of English smoking pipes—one near to its very beginnings. So the story goes, Sasieni himself worked for Dunhill during its early days. But eventually he left Dunhill, having his own ideas about how pipes should be made, and founded Sasieni. This was 1919, and Sasieni has been the closest thing to a household name in English pipes ever since.

After a legal battle with Dunhill prevented Sasieni from using a one dot stem inlay, Joel Sasieni was forced to come up with a new way of marking the company’s most perfect pipes. So, Sasieni started using inlays comprised of four dots, instead. Thus was born the “Four Dot,” which, funnily enough, came to rival even Dunhill’s “White Spot” as a signifier for high-grade, English-made pipes.

This particular pipe is one of those Four Dots, and it’s one that was, furthermore, made during Joel Sasieni’s tenure at the helm of the Sasieni company. Based on the “fishtail,” cursive Sasieni nomenclature, the pipe will have been made before Joel’s passing and the handing over of the reins to his son, Alfred Sasieni, around 1945-6. Furthermore, the inclusion of the “Buckingham” designation will place the pipe as having been made after 1935, when the practice was established. Unlike most contemporaneous makes, Sasieni would, between the 1930s and 1970s, not only use numbers to designate house shapes, but also the names of famous British locales, figures, and so on. Buckingham is, of course, the main palatial residence of the British royal family, and is also a town in the county of Buckinghamshire. For Sasieni, it was the make’s flagship oversized billiard rendition, also known as the “55,” seen here in a light, natural dress. On a last note, the inclusion of a patent registration number on the shank would appear to place the pipe more specifically in the 1935-39 date range, as this was when the0 Sasieni company purportedly stamped its pipes with such when exporting to the US.

The condition is good for a pipe of its age. Some charring on the inner rim, chamber slightly over-reamed, some minor scratches on the bowl, and faint (though legible up close) nomenclature.

Details: 

Length: 6.2″ / 157.4mm

Bowl Width: 0.91 / 23.11mm

Bowl Depth: 1.65″ / 41.91mm

Weight: 1.9oz / 54g