Italian Ceramics: Catalogue of the J. Paul Getty Museum Collection

27A Reverse.

that he used a drawing made from the original. Never­

theless, this example of a maiolica plate copying a draw­

ing by an important Umbrian artist is remarkable and

may help shed light on the methods of an active Renais­

sance pottery.^9

The Museum's plate forms part of a group of thirteen

large piatti da pompa that combine istohato subjects

with berettino decoration, all of which measure be­

tween forty and fifty cm in diameter. This group in­

cludes two plates with the subject of Alexander and

Diogenes (Washington, D.C., Corcoran Gallery of Art,

inv. 26.309,^10 and formerly Berlin, Schlossmuseum, inv.

K1834);^11 three plates with the Judgment of Paris (Lon­

don, Victoria and Albert Museum, inv. C.2110-1910;^12

and Ecouen, Musee de la Renaissance, Cluny nos. 2436-

37);^13 three plates with the subject of Diana and Actaeon

(Faenza, Museo Internazionale delle Ceramiche,

donazione Fanfani, inv. 25009;^14 Braunschweig, Herzog

Anton Ulrich-Museum, inv. 1155;^15 and Dortmund,

Museum fur Kunst und Kuturgeschichte der Stadt Dort­

mund, Schloss Cappenberg, inv. C6909);^16 a plate with a

scene of the Rape of Europa (Toronto, George R. Gardiner

Museum of Ceramic Art);^17 one with the Rape of Helen

that was recently sold from the Rothschild collection,

London,-^18 and two plates—one with an architect hand­

ing the model of a church to a Roman general, now in the

Musee du Louvre, Paris,- and the second with the Temp­

tation of Adam and Eve, now in the State Hermitage,

Saint Petersburg—that have been attributed to the so-

called Master of the Taft Orpheus, possibly in the Faen-

tine workshop of Casa Pirota.^19

The fact that many subjects are repeated suggests

that a limited number of print or drawing sources were

used, from which the ceramic scenes would have been

158 Plate with Hero and Leander