A Louis XIV mounted dish

A Louis XIV silvered and gilt bronze-mounted Chinese porcelain jardiniere – circa 1710 

The porcelain early Kangxi Period (1662-1722)

 Height: 11 cm. (4 ¼ in.)     Width: 28.5 cm. (11 ¼ in.)     Depth: 20.5 cm. (8 in.)

 

Provenance

PIASA, Hotel Drouot, Paris, 6 June 1997, lot 14

Maurice Segoura, Paris

The Collection of Linda Wachner, Paris

 

Comparative Literature

D.Alcouffe et al., Les bronzes d’ameublement du Louvre, Paris, 2004 pp. 46-47, no. 16.

 

The gilt bronze mounts at the sides of this jardiniere are connected by strapwork which supports the handles and which incorporates a fleur-de-lis, a shell and a trident framed by two dolphins. This heraldic device would only be used by a royal prince of the house of France with maritime or naval links. It therefore seems likely that the dish or jardiniere was made for Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon (1678-1737), the Comte de Toulouse and illegitimate son of Louis XIV and the Marquise de Montespan. In 1683 at the age of five, his father appointed him Grand Admiral of France.

 

A pair of Chinese porcelain pots in the Louvre with nearly identical side mounts have a documented provenance to the Comte de Toulouse’s daughter-in-law (invs. OA 11959 and 11960; illustrated in Alcouffe, op. cit., no. 16).