Agate cup - Antoine-Désiré Froment-Meurice (1801-1855)

Antoine-Désiré Froment-Meurice (1801-1855).
Cup.
Agate, silver, vermeil and onyx. Small guarantee hallmark with boar's head. 
Circa 1840-1845. 

An agate cup is supported by a hoop decorated with ivy leaves and a palm tree foot. The gilt silver terrace which rests on another agate bowl supports a silver rider overcoming a soldier on the ground. The latter is decorated with a frieze of onyx cabochons. 
This cup can be attributed to Froment-Meurice : the same model, with a variation on the foot, was displayed in 2003 at the Musée de la vie romantique during the exhibition Trésors d'argent, les Froment-Meurice, orfèvres romantiques parisiens. It is a creation of the silversmith commissioned by the Russian prince Alexei Soltycoff. Given the prince's erudition and his career as a diplomat in the East, it is likely that it is a representation of the defense of Vienna against the Ottomans by Jean Sobieski in 1672.
We also know that an engraving of the counterpart of this cup is represented in a bound album for the Empress Eugenie, kept in the Department of Art Objects of the Louvre Museum.