Page 287 - Chinese and japanese porcelain silk and lacquer Canepa

of silver cruets were commonly made for use during
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diet, but also for packing herring and preserving other meats and foods. The high
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the Catholic Mass service, one to contain wine of the
Eucarist and the other water. value of salt, and at the same time that of silver, is attested by the small heaps of salt
917 Krahl, 2009, p. 331.
918 I am greatly indebted to Nuno Vasallo e Silva, held in a wide variety of silver salts, of round, triangular or hexagonal shape, on laid
Deputy-Director Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, tables depicted in Dutch still life paintings. Visual evidence of the use of silver
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Lisbon, for information on this silver jug typology
and for granting me permission to illustrate this hexagonal salts in the early seventeenth century is provided by a portrait painting by
example. Published in Nuno Vassallo e Silva,
Ourivesaria Portuguesa de Aparato Séculos XV e Frans Hals entitled Banquet of the Officers of the St. George Militia dated 1616, 947 the
XVI – 15th and 16th Century Portuguese Ceremonial painting of a laid table by the Haarlem artist Pieter Claesz (c.1597–1660), signed and
Silver, Lisbon, 2012, pp. 76–77.
919 This example is one of four Wanli porcelain pieces dated 1627 (Fig. 3.4.2.1.3), and a portrait painting by the Amsterdam artist and
948
with silver-gilt figure mounts associated with
William Cecil, Lord Burghley, which are now in the architect Thomas Hendricksz de Keyser (1596/7–1667) entitled Portrait of a Young
Metropolitan Museum in New York, discussed Silversmith, dated 1630. The engraved hexagonal salt depicted in the latter painting
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earlier.
920 The Florentine artist Jacopo da Empoli (1551–1640) appears to be supported on six ball feet and features a small concave bowl on its top to
depicts an ewer with a figure handle together with
other sumptuous silver-gilt and silver pieces in hold the salt. These paintings show that Dutch silver hexagonal salts not always had
his painting Honesty of Saint Eligius, dated 1614. their flat stepped base supported on ball feet, as was originally the example made by
Published in in Vassallo e Silva, 2012, pp. 118–119.
921 The jars of square section are found in the an anonymous silversmith illustrated in Fig. 3.4.2.1.2. Thus the lion mask and paw
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Fundação Medeiros e Almeida in Lisbon and a
private collection in Brazil; those with six-lobed feet of the porcelain salts discussed here may have been an invention of the Jingdezhen
bodies are in the same collection in Brazil and the potters. Although the latter silver salt is considered to be a fake, it would have been
British Museum (illustrated here). For images and a
discussion on these jars, see Pinto de Matos, 1998, based on a metal original of similar shape, and thus serves to illustrate this hexagonal
pp. 160–161, no. 14; Krahl and Harrison-Hall, 1994,
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pp. 24–25, no. 6; Harrison-Hall, 2001, p. 376, no. model with a concave receptacle on the top for the salt. It is not known whether the
12:61; Vinhais and Welsh, 2003, pp. 24–27, no. 2; and Kraak salts originally had a porcelain saucer or bowl specially made for this purpose.
Pinto de Matos, 2011, pp. 184–189, nos. 72 and 73.
922 See, for instance, a Portuguese silver spout dating In current literature, these porcelain salts are described as having been ordered
to c.1525 in the Museu de Arte Sacra, Funchal
published in Vasallo e Silva, 2012, p. 123. Winged privately and made in about 1600, during the Wanli reign. It is still unclear who
cherubs are also depicted on a contemporary water ordered them. Visual sources demonstrate that by this time hexagonal salts were
fountain carved in stone in a church in Lisbon, which
is published in Pavilhão de Santa Fé, Fons Vitae, used at the dinner table of rich merchants in the Southern Netherlands, as seen in an
exhibition catalogue, 1998, p. 97, pl. 43. Others
are engraved on the body of a silver-gilt flower engraving published by Assuerus van Londerseel (1572–1635) in c.1600 after Nicolaes
vase of Aragonese or Castilian origin made in the de Bruyn (1571–1656), a native of Antwerp who worked in the city until 1617 (Fig.
third quarter of the century, which also has figure
handles. Published in Oman, 1968, pl. 138, fig. 215. 3.4.2.1.4). This engraving, together with 16 porcelain salts listed in the inventory of
923 Krahl and Harrison-Hall, 1994, p. 24, no. 6; and
Harrison-Hall, 2001, p. 376. Philip II’s possessions drawn up between 1598 and 1607, the ‘two porcelain salts’ sent
924 Examples from the shipwreck can be found in the by Philip III to Isabella Clara in 1603, and the ‘2 porcelain salt cellars’ listed in the
National Museum of the Philippines and the Museo
Naval in Madrid. Published in Tan, 2007, p. 152, fig. 1619 inventory of Breda Castle, raise a few questions: What shape were the porcelain
150.
925 Jars of this shape appear to have been first made salts listed in the aforementioned inventories? Were they made after European silver
in Iran in the eleventh century, as suggested by the or earthenware models, or were simply Chinese shapes adapted to this particular use?
fragments of an example from Amul, now in the
Art Institute of Chicago, published in Gregory J. More importantly, could porcelain salts of the hexagonal shape discussed here have
Higby and Elaine C. Stroud (eds.), History of Drug
Containers and Their Labels, Madison, 1999, p. 5. been made to order for Iberian merchants rather than Dutch merchants at the turn of
The shape spread in popularity throughout the the sixteenth century? Future research might shed light to these questions.
Near East, and was adopted in Syria from the end
of the following century. Archival evidence shows A Kraak porcelain box of cylindrical form with a domed cover perforated with
that such jars, used to store medicinal substances
or perfumes, were often exported with their small holes and bud finial that appears to be a unique example of its type was made
contents to Europe. They are mentioned in French, in the Chongzhen reign (Fig. 3.4.2.1.5). This box has been described as a spice box.
Spanish and Italian inventories of the fourteenth
and sixteenth centuries. Europeans copied these However, the ‘cruets of chinna’ sent by Lady Brillianna Harvey as a gift in 1638
imported jars in majolica and used them to store
costly spices, medicines and sweetmeats both in mentioned earlier, which according to Glanville and Pierson refer to sugar casters,
the apothecary and home. Archaeological finds suggest that this particular shape may have also served for this purpose. The shape
from the 1625 VOC shipwreck Batavia includes a
Fig. 3.4.2.1.5 Kraak spice box or minimum of 32 majolica albarelli jars, which do not was most probably copied from a pewter, earthenware or wooden model, like the salts
sugar caster show evidence of having had labels denoting their
Jingdezhen kilns, Jiangxi province contents. discussed above, which in turn copied a Dutch silver model. Visual evidence is found
Ming dynasty, Chongzhen reign (1628–1644) 926 María Antonia Casanovas, ‘Ceramics in Domestic in an identical silver box depicted alongside a Kraak dish in a still life painting by the
Height: 12.7cm; diameter: 7.6cm Life in Spain’, in Robin Farwell Gavin, Donna
Private Collection, United States Pierce and Alfonso Pleguezuelo (eds.), Cerámica y Utrecht artist Jan Davidz. de Heem (1606–1684) dated 1658, now in the Paleis Het
Cultura. The Story of Spanish and Mexican Mayólica,
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Albuquerque, 2003, p. 53. Loo Nationaal Museum in Apeldoorn (Fig. 3.4.2.1.6).
Fig. 3.4.2.1.6 Vivat Orange 927 Carré, Desroches and Goddio, 1994, pp. 176–177;
Oil on canvas, 63cm x 49cm Museo Naval, Piezas Arquelógicas de la nao San Of particular interest are two Chongzhen beer mugs of identical shape made
Jan Davidz. de Heem (1606–1684), signed Diego en el Museo Naval de Madrid, Madrid, 1999, after a stoneware or tin-glazed earthenware model in the Groninger Museum
and dated 1658 pp. 13, 17 and 20 ; and Crick, 2000, pp. 23 and 30, (Fig. 3.4.2.1.7). Perhaps they are of the type described as ‘new and rare porcelains like
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Paleis Het Loo Nationaal Museum, Apeldoorn fig. 2.
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