La Fécondité
Pickleherring Pottery (c.1618-1723)
Category
Ceramics
Date
circa 1650
Materials
Tin-glazed earthenware
Measurements
19 in (l)15.5 in (w)
Place of origin
Southwark
Order this imageCollection
Vyne Estate, Hampshire
NT 718629
Summary
Charger, tin glazed earthenware ('delftware') oval, relief-mounted with La Fécondité, Pickleherring Pottery, Southwark, London. c. 1650
Full description
The design of this charger may be based upon the trompe l'oeil paintings by Rosso Fiorentino (1491-1540) and Francesco Primatticcio (1504-1570), entitled The Unity of The State painted for the Grand Galerie at Chateau de Fontainebleau for the King of France François I (1494-1546) in the 1530s. The design included the Danaë, a seated female figure with children, but a pewter or metalware form may have been the prototype. Sixteenth-century French lead-glazed earthenware dishes with similar designs survive and have been attributed to Bernard Palissy (1509-1590). However, recent research suggests that Palissy may not have made the prototype. His successors at Fontainebleau were the potters Claude and Jean Barthélemy. In 1620, on the death of Jean Barthélemy, his estate was sent to London, where the wares and moulds were sold. Based on the seventeen dated examples, these dishes were made between 1633 and 1697. At least 41 English examples have been identified. A comparable example to this charger and dated to 1651 is in the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, Glaisher Collection, 1422-1928.
Makers and roles
Pickleherring Pottery (c.1618-1723), maker
References
Slater 1999: Graham Slater, ‘English Delftware ‘Palissy’ Dishes based on a ‘La Fécondité’ design’, Transactions of the English Ceramic Circle, Vol. 17 Part 1 1999, 47-64