An Italian maiolica documentary istoriato large dish, 1539, workshop of Guido Durantino

C. Ravanelli Guidotti, `Alcuni inediti per il III volume del Corpus della maiolica italiana datata di Gaetano Ballardini', Faenza, nos.1-6, 2003, pp. 102-104, pl. 1, figs. a-b.

Ettore A. Sannipoli et al., La Via della Ceramica tra Umbria e Marche. Maioliche Rinascimentali da Collezioni Private, Palazzo Ducale, Gubbio, 2010, pp. 238ff.

The scene on the present dish is from the engraving by Jacopo Caraglio after Rosso Fiorentino. It illustrates a story in Ovid's Metamorphoses, Book V of the daughters of Pierus who, swollen with pride at their numbers saw themselves as the equals of the Muses and challenged them to a singing contest which was to be judged by Apollo's nymphs. The Pierides sang of the war with the gods, granting false honours to the giants whilst lessening the actions of the mighty deities, claiming the Gods hid from Typhoeus. The Muses propose Calliope to represent them, and she offers up her songs to Ceres and her daughters. The Nymphs, having sworn to judge the contest fairly, in one voice gave the honours to the Muses thereby drawing the abuse and ridicule of the Pierides. This short-sighted show of rancour invited punishment and the sisters were transformed into chattering magpies.

The arms are those of the important Sienese family of Petrucci. A dish in the collection of the British Museum with the arms of Petrucci above two others is illustrated by D. Thornton & T. Wilson, Italian Renaissance Ceramics A Catalogue of the British Museum Collection, 2009, Vol. I, pp. 176-180, no. 114 and may have been commissioned for Pandolfo Petrucci, known as `The Magnificent’. Pandolfo rose to power having assumed the offices of his late brother, Giacoppo in 1497 and with the support of the Borghese, to whom he was related by marriage, he became the ruler of Siena, a position maintained by the family until 1524.

A similar dish to the present example, without a coat of arms, with documentary inscription but not dated is in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. See J. E. Poole, Italian Maiolica and Incised Slipware in the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, 1995, pp. 365-6, the author lists other known examples, not including the present dish. Included in this list is a dish, now lost, from the collection of the Schlossmuseum, Berlin with the monogram interpreted as ORATIO, which could be that of Guido Durantino's son, Orazio, also known as Orazio Fontana, see A.V.B. Norman, Wallace Collection Catalogue of Ceramics 1 Pottery, Maiolica, Faience, Stoneware, 1976, p. 207.