5
Relief-Blue Jar with
a Fish
Tuscany, probably Florence
ca. 1420-40
Tin-glazed earthenware
H: 16.5 cm (6V2 in.)
Diam (at lip): 9.7 cm (3^13 /i6 in.)
W (max.): 12. 2 cm (4^13 /i6 in.)
85.DE.5 7
MARKS AND INSCRIPTIONS
None.
CONDITION
Minor chips and overpainting on the rim.
PROVENANCE
Luigi Grassi, Florence, sold to A. Lederer; August
Lederer (d. 1936), Vienna; by inheritance to his
widow, Serena Lederer, 1936; Serena Lederer
(d. 1943), Vienna; looted from Serena Lederer's col
lection by the Nazis, 1938; stored in Nazi depot in
Vienna at Bartensteingasse, 8 (it appears as no. 183
on inventory list); restituted by the Austrian gov
ernment to her son, Erich Lederer, 1947,- Erich
Lederer (1896-1985), Geneva; by inheritance
to his widow, Elisabeth Lederer, 1985; Elisabeth
Lederer, Geneva; sold to the J. Paul Getty Mu
seum, 1985.
EXHIBITIONS
None.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Rothenstein 1944, 205, pi. Q Cora 1973, 1: 78;
2 : fig. 83c; Conti 1980, no. 48; GettyMusJ 14
(1986): 251, no. 213; Hess 1988A, no. 6; Conti
et al. 1991, 258, no. 94; Summary Catalogue
2001, no. 344.
THIS ESSENTIALLY CYLINDRICAL VESSEL, though
slightly wider at the base, is characteristic of the al-
barello form, a container shape that was used to store
drugs and other materials (fig. 5 B). The surface is painted
with a vertically placed fish surrounded by leaves and
dots (or "berries") in thick cobalt blue pigment [zaffera a
hlievo) outlined in manganese purple on a pinkish white
ground. The background is scattered with manganese
dots and curved lines that echo the dot shapes. Down
one side and around the rim, wavy manganese lines are
punctuated by blue dots. The interior is tin glazed. The
vessel's small size suggests that it must be a quartuccio,
or quarter measure.
Although commonly thought to be of Hispano-
Moresque derivation, this fish motif appears to be de
rived instead from Italian archaic maiolica prototypes
that may in turn have been based directly on Islamic
models.^1 A drug jar in a private Florentine collection that
displays a horizontally placed fish may be one of the few
maiolica objects with this motif that directly relate to
Hispano-Moresque or Near Eastern types.^2 This fish mo
tif in the more common vertical position is found on
other early Florentine jars, although of the two-handled
form, also with oak-leaf and berry embellishment.^3
Although the fish—both as a vertical and horizontal
decorative element—is rather common, the small al-
barello shape of this piece is not. Of the L73 relief-blue
ceramics identified as Tuscan published in an extensive
compendium of this typology (excluding four groups of
fragments), 126 are two-handled jars (orciuoli), 35 are
jugs (boccali), 6 are plates, 2 are wet-drug jars (utelli), 1 is
a bucket, and only 3 are cylindrical jars [albarelli], the
present example being much the smallest of the group.^4
Two examples of small cylindrical jars identified as from
Faenza and a larger example from Viterbo are also listed,
but all three of these display surface decoration signifi
cantly different from that on the present jar.^5 Whether
this was a shape not considered practical or, conversely,
whether objects of this shape were used extensively—
thus suffering frequent damage or destruction—is not
known.
Notes
- Valeri 1984, 478, 480, 481 n. 24.
- Cora 1973, 2: fig. 82; Valeri 1984, 480 n. 24, 494 n. 85.
- For other examples see Cora 1973 , 2: figs. 83a-b, 84a-c, pi. 85; Bojani
1990 , 170, pi. i; Cole 1977, 84-85, 100-101, nos. 40, 51. For ex
amples on archaic maiolica, see Cora 1973, 2: pis. 14a, 16a, 17a, 20. - Conti et al. 1991, 248-68.
- Conti et al. 1991, 269, 291.
42