A LONDON DELFTWARE POLYCHROME POMEGRANATE DISH CIRCA 1635 |

perhaps Christian Wilhelm, Pickleherring Quay, Southwark, painted in the center with four pomegranates resting on green and ochre leaves, the crimped rim decorated with raised bosses and foliate scrolls.

Jonathan Horne, London, March, 1986, bearing label
Vogel Collection no. 442

Jonathan Horne, A Collection of Early English Pottery, Part VI, Cat. no. 135
Michael Archer, Delftware, The Tin-glazed Earthenware of the British Isles, London, 1997, p. 82, cited.

In good appearance. There is typical glaze loss to protruding parts of rim and to raised bosses. A minor hairline crack to rim, with some infill to edge, then minor hairline cracks. There is some glaze loss to center of dish, probably associated with production.
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At least two dated dishes of this form, scale and decoration are recorded which confirm an early production date. One blue and white dish dated 1636, with eighteen bosses and similar stylized motifs at the rim is in the Glaisher Collection in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, illustrated by Louis L. Lipski and Michael Archer, Dated English Delftware, Tin-glazed Earthenware 1600-1800, London, 1984, p. 18, no. 5. The second, painted in the same minimal color palette as the present dish, inscribed and dated 'C /I A', '1637' and depicting Mary Salome to the center, is illustrated by Michael Archer, op. cit., pp. 101-102, A.53. The latter has a possible attribution to Richard Irons of Southwark. 

Relief bossed rims feature on two large chargers painted with the Temptation of Adam and Eve, one inscribed and dated 'T/ T M/ 1635' in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, mus. no. C.26-1931, see Michael Archer, op. cit., p. 81, A.13; the second illustrated by John C. Austin, British Delft at Williamsburg, Williamsburg, 1994, p. 128, no. 155. Sherds of a similar type have been found at the Pickleherring site. Embossed dishes of this type are recorded in Netherlandish delft, a larger dish painted with pomegranates is in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, ob. no. BK-NM-12391, and further examples are illustrated by D. Korf, Haarlemse Majolica - en tegelbakkers, Haarlem, 1968, pls. 1-2, 8.