CIRCA 1723, THE REVERSE WITH LUSTRE NUMERALS 723

Although the present dish was part of the important King Umberto II of Italy sale at Christie’s Geneva in 1968, it is not clear if it was one of the items given in 1725 by Augustus ‘the Strong’, King of Poland and Elector of Saxony, to his friend Vittorio Amadeo II, King of Sardinia, in Turin. The 1725 gift is exceptional and important as it was one of the earliest and most prestigious diplomatic gifts to include Meissen porcelain. The Meissen porcelain in the gift included newer pieces which had been made shortly before the gift took place (such as the famous armorial tea and chocolate-service painted by J.G. Höroldt),¹ and older pieces, including Böttger-period stoneware and Böttger-period porcelain.² The Geneva 1968 sale included items which are clearly too late to have been part of the 1725 gift, but as the present dish most probably dates from around 1723, as indicated by the use of underglaze blue, and the absence of any factory marks on the reverse (whether the lustre numerals 723 on the reverse refer to a date is unclear), it could perhaps have been part of the 1725 gift.

The preceding lot (lot 56) in the 1968 Royal sale was a Meissen dish which was also decorated with a Japanese Kakiemon-inspired pattern. This dish (painted with the flying phoenix and bound hedges pattern), was of a similar size to the present lot and it also bore the same lustre numerals 723 on the reverse. As the sale catalogue notes, it was probably en suite to the present lot. Four dishes of flying phoenix type remain in the Palazzo Reale in Turin, and it is very probable that the present lot was once part of this group. It is not clear when these pieces entered the Savoy collection, but they appear in the 1871 inventory, so they must have entered the collection before that date.³

Annotations to the 1721 inventory of the Japanese Palace in Dresden record how a variety of pieces were chosen for the gift to the King of Sardinia.⁴ The present lot does not appear to be among the pieces listed. As noted by Cassidy-Geiger, the palace ‘was a bit of a waystation or storehouse for porcelain gifts’.⁵ It is also not clear from the shipping list of what was sent to Turin in 1725 if the present lot was among the porcelain sent.⁶

1. The principal part of this armorial service, which was previously thought to have been lost, was sold from the collection of a ‘Member of the Royal House of Savoy’ by Christie’s, London, on 4 July 2019 , lot 104.
2. The Böttger-period white vase from King Umberto’s Geneva sale, lot 22, has been identified as a component of the 1725 gift, see Ingelore Menzhausen, ‘Ein Porzellangeschenk Augusts Der Starken für den König von Sardinien’ in Keramos No. 119, 1988, p. 99. Fig. 1. Also see lot 78 in this sale.
3. The 1986 Palazzo Reale exhibition catalogue notes that in the inventory of 1871, the dishes / plates were included as a series of six, but in 1882 and 1911 this increased to thirteen described as ‘di porcellana antica Chinese di varia forma con decorazioni assortite’, but more recent inventories now record them as a distinct group of four. See Andreina Grisieri and Giovanni Romano (Eds.), Porcellane e argenti del Palazzo Reale di Torino, Palazzo Reale, Turin, Exhibition Catalogue, 1986, pp. 231-232, no. 70.
4. The transcription of this inventory (with annotations dating up to 1727) was published by Ingelore Menzhausen, Böttgersteinzeug Böttgerporzellan, 1969, pp. 36-53 (for the white porcelain pieces).
5. Cassidy-Geiger, ‘Princes and Porcelain on the Grand Tour of Italy’ in Cassidy-Geiger (Ed.), Fragile Diplomacy: Meissen Porcelain for European Courts ca. 1710-63, Bard Graduate Center Exhibition Catalogue, 2007, p. 242, note. 12.
6. Documents HStA13458, currently on loan to the Porzellansammlung, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Archives (‘Verschiedene Specificationen und Belege über Zu-und Abgänge 1700-1876’), ‘Nachrichten von den Sächssischen Porcellain so im Monath Septemb: Anno 1725 nach Turin ist geschicket worden.’ A transcription of the full shipping list of what was sent is published by Maureen Cassidy-Geiger, ibid., 2007, pp. 327-331.