A rare Hispano-Moresque Albarello, Valencia, Probably Manises, 1400-1450 AD

of cylindrical body, with a tall neck and slanting shoulder, standing on a short foot-ring, decorated with seven horizontal bands and covered in a blue and copper-lustre, decorated around the neck with a band of criss–cross motifs, painted in cobalt-blue and gold-lustre, a small frieze in Greek decorates the shoulder, framed by a small blue line, band decorated with al-afiya motifs, 'good health', alternating with epigraphy in reserve, a plaited band in reserve on a gold-lustre ground and a band of calligraphic inscriptions in reserve frames a vertical band, decorated with cypress tree leaves in reserve and painted in blue, the last band is decorated with calligraphic motifs Al-Mulk, 'Kingdom' painted in blue and gold lustre

Ex-Collection Otto Beit
Otto Beit (1865-1930) was a German-born British banker, philanthropist, and collector of some renown.

This massive albarello is a splendid example of lustreware associated with the fifteenth-century production centre of Valencia, Spain.

Indeed the vase shares most of its decorative layout with some of the best examples known from the period between 1400 and 1450 AD. Thus the majestic pseudo-Kufic along the bottom register appears exactly identical on an example in the Museo Arqueologico in Madrid (unpublished), as well as on an albarello in the British Museum, London, (inv.no.1878, 1230.331). The upright palmettes depicted on the main band appear in an identical fashion on two albarelli in the Instituto de Valencia de Don Juan (see Balbina Martinez Caviró, Ceramica Hispanomusulmana, pl.134, p.142 and pl.136, p.143, both attributed to 1400-1450 AD, Madrid 1991).

Also the blue hatched squares, forming a lattice pattern, around the neck can be seen on an example, also attributed to the early fifteenth century, in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, (inv.no. 46-1907), as well as on an albarello in the British Museum, London, (inv.no.1878,1230.332). The blue cursive calligraphy can be compared with the one depicted around the neck of an albarello originally in the Gillot collection, and sold at Christie's Paris, March 2008, lot 365.

Finally the white cursive calligraphic band on lustre, which runs just below the central band, is identical to an example in the British Museum, (inv.no.1878,1230.332), and it is also comparable to one showing on the well-known example in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (see, Mariam Rosser-Owen, Islamic Arts from Spain, London, 2010, p.98, pl.92), and also on an example formerly in the Homaizi Collection, and now in the Museum of Islamic Art, Doha, Qatar (see Louisiana Revy, Art from the World of Islam, 8th-18th Century, fig.176, p.102, Vol.27, no.3, March 1987).