Italian, Faenza, circa 1525-30

Sotheby’s London, 16 March 1976, lot 13. 

This Faenza bowl depicts the story of Mucius Scaevola, one of the most famous episodes of Roman heroism popular throughout the Renaissance. The story was recounted by the first-century Roman writer Valerius Maximus in his anthology of tales from antiquity translated into Italian in 1504.¹ When Porsenna, King of the Etruscans, invaded Rome, Scaevola tried to assassinate him but was captured. Scaevola demonstrated his bravery in front of Porsenna by holding his hand over an open flame. Porsenna was so impressed with Scaevola's fortitude that he agreed to release him. 

This attractive dish belongs to a small group of istoriato pieces, several of them painted on a blue-tinted (berettino) glaze, attributable to Faenza workshops about 1525-30. The group shares some of the same details such as the palette, the leaf-shaped trees with serrated edges, the wave-like appearance of the mountains and the simplistic drawing of legs. Among these are a dish in the British Museum;² one in a private collection with an unidentified subject including musical instruments;³ and one with The Conversion of Saul⁴ which is marked B.

The date range is supported by celebrated documentary pieces of Faenza maiolica including a bowl at Sèvres marked as made in the workshop known as the Casa Pirota⁵ in 1525 and a deep bowl in the Museo Internazionale delle Ceramiche in Faenza, marked as made in the workshop of Piero Bergantini in 1529.⁶ The painter of this dish may have worked in the Casa Pirota or (perhaps more probably) the workshop of the Bergantini brothers.

¹ D. Thorton and T. Wilson, Italian Renaissance Ceramics - A Catalogue of the British Museum Collection, London 2009, no. 73

² Ibid, no. 88

³ T. Wilson and C. Maritano, L’Italia del Rinascimento. Lo splendore della maiolica, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo Madama, Turin, 2019, no. 61

⁴ C. Ravanelli Guidotti, Thesaurus di opere della tradizione di Faenza, Faenza, 1998, p. 341, fig. 6

⁵ Ibid., op. cit., p. 342, figs. 7 and 8

⁶ Ibid., op. cit, pp. 351-5, no. 86