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Lot Essay
See Geoffrey de Bellaigue, French Porcelain in the Collection of her Majesty the Queen, London, 2009, Vol. II, pp. 558-560, no. 132 for a pair of bird-painted bleu lapis-ground half-size bottle-coolers (seau à demi-bouteille) of the same shape and with the same handle form, where the author notes that an 'indication of early date is the manner in which the ground colour extends up to the rim', as seen on the present example. The earliest recorded sale of bottle-coolers is dated 2 September 1751 and they had been fired in the kiln in 1750. By 1757 the handle form had evolved into the more compact scroll and shell type which was in use until the end of the century, see the pair of seau à liqueur rond also in Her Majesty's Collection, illustrated by Geoffrey de Bellaigue, ibid., London, 2009, Vol. II, p. 581, no. 141. In Volume III, Glossary A, pp. 1230-1231 the author gives a full account of the evolvement of this shape concluding that coolers of this form were distinguished for the most part by size and can be classified into five groups with this example corresponding to that of a seau à liqueur rond; see p. 1231, fig. 5.5 for a drawing held in the Sèvres archives that in theory establishes the names given to each cooler based on variations in size. In the 19th and 20th century coolers were frequently described as flowerpots and Geoffrey de Bellaigue notes that 'even in the eighteenth century alternative uses for coolers were sanctioned'.