This brass jug exhibited at the Nevyansk Historical and Architectural Museum was made almost three centuries ago, in 1756. Brass is a copper-based alloy, half of which is zinc. Until the late 18th century, this composition also included charcoal.

Brass was easy to process both cold and heated; it maintained durability and plasticity, did not oxidize over time, and did not corrode. Moreover, this alloy was relatively inexpensive and looked beautiful: carefully polished dishes made of it resembled gold ones. The shade of the product depended on the proportions of copper and zinc in the alloy and varied from reddish to light yellow. In many families, brass dishes were considered festive: they were put on the table only on special occasions. Sometimes the cost of such products was estimated by the number of marten skins that could fit in them.

The first brass factory in Russia appeared in 1939. It was built at the Byngovskiy iron smelter, a few kilometers from present-day Nevyansk. This plant, just like the one in Nevyansk, belonged to the Demidovs, a dynasty of Ural industrial tycoons. Grigory Makhotin, a clerk of the Nevyansk plant, in his ‘Memorial Book on Factory Production…’, which he wrote in 1767–1770, noted that the factory was ‘built in the so-called new manner; at one lower end, six sazhens long and seven sazhens wide, on one shaft there were three hammers for forging copper, and a fourth small spare one for adjusting (when making) dishes <…> the forge in which copper is fired is made of bricks <…>’ Even boys, starting from the age of 8, worked on the manufacture of dishes from copper and copper alloys.

At the bottom of the jug exhibited in the Nevyansk museum, we can still see the SIBIR brand. It usually marked the products manufactured at the Demidov plants. This brand was considered a sign of quality. Next to it, the bottom of the jug features the stamped date of its manufacture: 1756.