CIRCA 1520

Details

A DERUTA BLUE-GROUND CHARGER
CIRCA 1520
Decorated a candeliere with gold lustre, with a young woman in flowing classical robes holding a slender cornucopia, her hand supporting one end of a billowing ribbon inscribed · SOLA · MISERIA · CHARET · INVIDIA · IN · C OR · DOMINI · SVI ·, the border with scrolling foliage and two large cornucopiae of fruit, the tendrils suspending waisted tablets at each side, one inscribed PENSA, the other ELFIN, within a lustred band rim (losses to glaze over-painted at part of centre, slight scratches to surface at centre, losses to glaze at rim and edge of well, rim with some chipping)
16¼ in. (41.3 cm.) diam.

Provenance

Ole Olsens Collection, Denmark, according to the paper collection label attached to the reverse (it is not recorded by Hermann Schmitz, Ole Olsens Kunstsammlungen, Munich, 1927)
Anon., sale Christie's London, 4th December 1985, lot 170.

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 15% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

The first part of the inscription which translates as 'only poverty is free from envy' is a phrase which was used frequently, the more usual spelling of 'charet' being 'caret', and it usually ended with 'invidia' (some citations refer it to the proverbs of Seneca). 'In cor domini sui' translates as 'in the heart of its master'.

A charger in the Victoria and Albert Museum with a very similar central figure is illustrated by Bernard Rackham, Catalogue of Italian Maiolica (London, 1940), Vol. II, pl. 75, no. 482. The majority of dishes of this type show half-length portraits of women, rather than full-length figures.

More from Italian Ceramic Art 1400-1900

View All