Provenance: The Danish agronomist in Russia, Councillor Carl Andreas Koefoed (1855–1948), who received it as a present from Tsaritsa Maria Feodorovna. Carl Andreas Koefoed was very influential in the attempts to implement agricultural reforms in Russia, inspired by Denmark in the 18th century. In 1878 he moved to Russia, then a land of opportunity, where he settled in Kaluga, south of Moscow, and where he also married. In 1906, Peter Stolypin became prime minister, and in this context, Carl Koefoed became State Councillor in the Ministry of Agriculture. He continued his work in Russia after the revolution, but had to leave in 1931, where he and his Russian-born wife settled in Denmark. Before the revolution in 1917 Carl Andreas Koefoed often visited the Russian Court, where Tsaritsa Maria Feodorovna valued talking with a fellow countryman. On one such occasion the talk was about buying a birthday gift for Carl Andreas Koefoed's wife. Instead Tsaritisa Maria Feodorovna gave him this chocolate cup that he could give his wife. In 1944 Carl Andreas Koefoed gave the chocolate cup to his Danish niece at her student party. In his speech he said among others - “remember that it is better to be frivolous than melancholy”. Thence by descent.