PERHAPS CIRCA 1570-1620, TUSCANY, PERHAPS CASTEL FIORENTINO OR EMPOLI

A very similar armorial dish incised with the arms of the Florentine Nelli family is in the British Museum and illustrated by Dora Thornton and Timothy Wilson, Italian Renaissance Ceramics, A Catalogue of the British Museum Collection, Vol. II, London, 2009, p. 680, no. 455. Archaeological finds from towns west of Florence, notably Empoli and Castelfiorentino, include fragments with closely parallel decoration, including a waster fragment dated 1614 found at Castelfiorentino. The authors also mention another plate with comparable ornament in the Museo Civico at Pistoia which is dated 1604. Another of the same type was sold in these Rooms on 2 July 1979, lot 24.