Caesar's Horse from a Triumph of Caesar
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Title/s | Caesar's Horse from a Triumph of Caesar |
Maker/s | Jacopo di Stefano Schiavone attributed to (painter)
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Collection |
F. Leverton Harris |
Category |
tin-glazed earthenware
maiolica (sub-category) |
Name | dish |
School/Style |
Renaissance |
Description | Maiolica dish, painted in polychrome with Caesar's Horse from a Triumph of Caesar. Buff earthenware, tin-glazed overall; on the reverse the glaze is off-white and has crawled in several places. Painted in dark blue, light blue, green, yellow, orange, and brownish-red. Shape approximately 67 but shallower. Circular with shallow, concave sides, which have warped in firing, standing on a solid base. Caesar's Horse, from a Triumph of Caesar. On the left are two nude musicians, with bells round their ankles, holding aloft, and blowing, double pipes. Behind them is a hound with bells on its collar, and a harness round its belly. Caesar's horse follows, its right foreleg raised; its harness and blanket with lettered border are bedecked with bells, and it has a unicorn's horn attached to its forehead. A youth holding a branch with a globe on its tip is mounted on its back and a monkey sits behind him. In the foreground there is a stony track and grass, and an 'H'. The background is dark blue and the rim yellow. The back is dated in the middle in blue, '1514' over the alchemical sign for tin, within three narrow concentric circles. Beyond the base there are three narrow, one broad and three narrow concentric circles, repeated nearer to the rim. A yellow band encircles the edge. |
Production Notes | Probably made in the workshop in Cafaggiolo founded in 1498 by Piero and Stefano di Filippo di Dimitri Schiavone from Montelupo. The dish has been attributed to Jacopo on the grounds of similarities to a dish decorated with an equestrian Judith with the Head of Holofernes, signed 'Japo in chaffagguolo' which is in the Victoria and Albert Museum. Jacopo di Stefano di Filippo died in 1576, and questions have been raised as to whether he and the painter of the dishes was the same man. The source for this scene was one of a set of twelve large woodcuts forming a Triumph of Caesar by Jacob Argentoratensis (Jacob of Strasbourg) to designs by Benedetto Bordon, published in Venice in 1504. The Triumph follows Appian's account of Scipio's entry into Rome at the end of the Second Punic War but details relating to Caesar were incorporated. His horse, for example, was based on Suetonius' description of it as having 'feet that were almost human; for its hoofs were cloven in such a way as to look like toes'. The maiolica painter followed the woodcut closely, including this feature, but omitted the small nude boy behind the horse. Each section of the Triumph is labelled with a letter from A to L, hence the 'H' below the scene. The next section, labelled 'I', occurs on a dish in the Victoria and Albert Museum, also dated 1514, but in Roman numerals. |
Production Place | Cafaggiolo (pottery) (place) Cafaggiolo (painter) (place) Tuscany (painter) (region) Italy (painter) (country) |
Technique Description | Dish. Buff earthenware, tin-glazed overall; on the reverse the glaze is off-white and has crawled in several places. Painted in dark blue, light blue, green, yellow, orange, and brownish-red |
Dimensions |
height: (whole): 5.2
cm
diameter: (rim): 40.4
cm
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Period | early 16th Century
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Date | dated 1514 |
Provenance |
bequeathed:
Harris, Frederick Leverton 1926 (Filtered for: Applied Arts collection) Auguste Ricard de Montferrande; sold Christie's, 14-16 November 1859, Catalogue of the very extensive and valuable collection of majolica ware, the property of that well-known amateur, Monsieur Auguste Ricard de Montferrand of St Petersburgh . . .; p. 18, lot 283 (£93.9); Alexander Barker; Sir Francis Cook, Bt.;Wyndham F. Cook; Humphrey Wyndham Cook; sold Christie's, 7 July 1925, Catalogue of an important collection of objects of art of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, the property of Humphrey W. Cook, Esq., and removed from 8 Cadogan Square, S.W., being a portion of the celebrated collection formed by the late Sir Francis Cook, Bart., p. 9, lot 21; The Right Hon. F. Leverton Harris.
F. Leverton Harris Bequest, 1926
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Inscriptions/Marks | -
inscription
Position: on the back
Method: painted
Content: 1514 over a 2 with a vertical stroke through the horizontal line
Description:
Interpretation: the date over the alchemical sign for tin
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label
Position: on the back
Method: printed in scarlet
Content: 26
Description: rectangular paper label with scarlet edge, printed 26 in scarlet
Interpretation: the number of the dish in the Cook collection
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label
Position: on the back
Method: printed in black
Content: 22
Description: scrap of paper label printed 22 in black
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Documentation | - Montferrand, Auguste Ricard de (1854) Aperçu sur l'art céramique italien collection de Mr. A. de Montferrand tiré d'un ouvrage intitulé 'Description de l'habitation d'un Maçon', St Petersburg [page: 7]
[comments: Publ. No. 56] - Fortnum, Charles Drury Edward (1873) A Descriptive Catalogue of the Maiolica, Hispano-Moresco, Persian Damascus and Rhodian Wares in the South Kensington Museum. With historical notices, marks, and monograms, London [page: 114]
[comments: Publ. Mentioned in connection with no. 6664-1860 in the Victoria and Albert Museum as having been in the Montferrand Collection sale. He incorrectly describes the scene as 'derived from part of Mantegna's Triumph of Caesar'.] - Burlington Fine Arts Club (1887) Catalogue of Specimens of Hispano-Moresque and Majolica Pottery Exhibited in 1887, London: Burlington Fine Arts Club [page: 33]
[comments: Publ. p. 33, no. 229, lent by Sir Francis Cook] - Rackham, Bernard (1903) Catalogue of Italian Majolica and other Pottery at 8 Cadogan Square, London [page: 6]
[comments: Publ. No. 26] - Borenius, Tancred (1926) Italian maiolica in the collection of the Right Hon. F. Leverton Harris - III, London [page: 15]
Source title: Apollo (July 1926)
[comments: Publ. Fig. I] - Borenius, Tancred (1931) The Leverton Harris Collection, London: Privately printed [page: p. 4]
[comments: Publ. Mentioned on p. 4, and illustrated in pl. VIA] - Balniel, Lord (1931) A Commemorative Catalogue of the Exhibition of Italian Art held in the Galleries of the Royal Academy, Burlington House, London, January-March, l930, London [page: 315]
[comments: Publ. No. 1039] - Ballardini, Gaetano (1933) Corpus della maiolica italiana, I, Le maioliche datate al l530, Rome [page: p. 42]
[comments: Publ. Cited p. 42, no. 56, and illustrated figs. 52 and 248R] - Rackham, Bernard (1952) Italian Maiolica, London: Faber & Faber [page: 17]
[comments: Publ.See text p. 17, illustrated pl. 48] - Haggar, Reginald (1960) The Concise Encyclopedia of Continental Pottery and Porcelain, London: André Deutsch [page: 291]
[comments: Publ. p. 291, pl. 89B] - Rackham, Bernard (1963) Italian Maiolica, London: Faber & Faber [page: 17]
[comments: Publ. See text p. 17, illustrated pl. 48] - Bellini, Mario (1964) Maioliche italiane del Rinascimento, Milan [page: 70]
[comments: Publ. Illustrated, p. 70 C] - Fleming, John (1977) The Penguin Dictionary of the Decorative Arts, London [page: 290]
[comments: Publ. p. 290, illustrated] - Massing, Jean Michel (1977) Jacobus Argentoratensis. Etude préliminaire, [page: 42-51]
Source title: Arte Veneta (1977)
[comments: Publ.] - Klein, Adalbert (1980) Fayencen Europas, Braunschweig [page: 115]
[comments: Publ. Illustrated pl. 119] - Cora, Galeazzo (1982) La maiolica di Cafaggiolo, Florence
[comments: Publ. Illustrated p. 32, pl. 11] - Tomobe, Naoshi (1986) Ceramic Art of the World, XXII, European Ceramics, Tokyo [page: 60]
[comments: Publ. Illustrated pl. 47] - Benini, Mirella (1989) Cafaggiolo (1498-1540), [page: 51]
Source title: Antichita Viva (1989)
[comments: Publ. Illustrated pl. 7] - Massing, Jean Michel (1990) The Triumph of Caesar by Benedetto Bordon and Jacobus Argentoratensis. Its iconography and influence, [page: 12]
Source title: Print Quarterly (March 1990)
[comments: Publ. Illustrated p. 12, fig. 18, and see p. 13] - Poole, Julia E. (1995) Italian Maiolica and Incised Slipware in the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, Cambridge (Cambs.): Cambridge University Press [page: 129-31]
[comments: Publ. pp. 129-31, no. 188. Colour Plate 10] - Bojani, Gian Carlo (1995) Ceramiche italiane a Cambridge/Italian Pottery in Cambridge, [page: 15]
Source title: D'Arigianato (December 1995)
[comments: Publ. Illustrated fig. 3] - Wilson, Timothy (1995) Art on the Table, London [page: 73]
Source title: Country Life (21 September 1995)
[comments: Publ. Illustrated fig. 4] - (1995) Italian style is dished up, Cambridge (Cambs.)
Source title: Cambridge Evening News (27 September 1995)
[comments: Publ. Illustrated in advertisement for the exhibition of Italian Maiolica in the Fitzwilliam Museum] - University of Cambridge (1995) Italian Maiolica in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (Cambs.): University of Cambridge
Source title: European News (1995)
[comments: Publ. front page, illustrated in black and white in publicity for the exhibition of 1995] - (1995) Le maioliche italiane del Fitzwilliam in mostra, Ferrara: Belriguardo [page: 17]
Source title: CeramicAntica (October 1995)
[comments: Publ. Illustrated p. 17] - Poole, Julia E. (1997) Fitzwilliam Museum Handbooks, Italian Maiolica, Cambridge (Cambs.): Cambridge University Press [page: 44-5]
[comments: Publ. pp. 44-5, no. 17] - Tench, Lucy (2000) Materials and Techniques in the Decorative Arts an Illustrated Dictionary, London: John Murray [page: 297]
[comments: Publ. Illustrated]
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Other Notes | |
Accession Number | C.86-1927 (Applied Arts)
(Reference Number: 47191; Input Date: 2002-05-05 / Last Edit: 2011-06-14) |
