Description
ovoid body shape with short lug handles applied to the upper body, painted in yellow, orange, ochre, blue, green and purple, a strapwork cartouche charged with arms of Medici impaling Toledo with a ring above, all on an ochre ground with dolphins and animal grotesques, the reverse painted with a male grotesque holding two dolphins with an emblem in the centre, possibly representing a crutch, on a blue and yellow squared ground, the upper body with cornucopiae, exotic birds and a central mask
Dimensions
43cm diam, 44cm high
Footnote
Note:
The decoration on this jar indicates the jar may have been made for the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence. For a similar shaped jar with handles and dated to the 1580sin the Museo Internazionale delle Ceramiche, Faenza, see cat 308-309, p. 366, F. Berti, Storia della ceramica di Montelupo, Volume Terzo, 1999