A pair of Castelli maiolica campana vases and covers, circa 1740

The Fountaine Collection, Narford Hall, Norfolk, probably acquired by Sir Andrew Fountaine (1676-1753), inv. nos. AF 19 and 20;

Recorded in the Octagon Closet at Narford Hall, in the Fountaine Family Inventory of 1835;

Thence by descent to Sir Andrew Fountaine IV (1808-73);

Christie's London,The Celebrated Fountaine Collection of Majolica, 16 June 1884, lot 72 (£43.1s to Philpot);

Bonhams, London, 23 May 2012, lot 50.

A. Moore, ‘The Fountaine Collection of Maiolica’, The Burlington Magazine, vol. 130, no. 1023, June 1988, pp. 435-447.

This pair of vases was part of one of the most celebrated collections of Renaissance maiolica and works of art ever formed, established first by the connoisseur and traveller Sir Andrew Fountaine (1676-1753), and subsequently added to by his descendants. In 1835, Andrew Fountaine IV (1808-1873), upon the death of his father Andrew Fountaine III and his inheritance of Narford Hall, drew up an inventory of the ‘Octagon Closet’ which housed the family’s collection of maiolica. According to the inventory, the room included “200 pieces of the ancient earthenware called Raphaels” and “about 200 pieces of the old French enamel on Copper”. The inventory was ordered by shelf and by object type, and were listed where applicable by the inscriptions on the backs of the objects. The vases are listed under 'Raphael ware Vases', numbers 4 and 5, described as 'The wise men offering. The Egyptians destroyed in the Red Sea. II.' The pair of vases is illustrated in a composite photograph of the China Room of Narford Hall, taken around 1884, on the first shelf to the left and right (reproduced by Moore, op. cit., p. 437).

The inventory of 1835, as transcribed in Moore, op. cit., states that "The collection here was bought or exchanged for something else by Sr. Andrew Fountaine from Cosmo the 3d. Grand Duke of Tuscany, who parted with as much as he could of the collection made by Lorenzo di Medicis, Duke of Urbino, for the Royal collection at Florence”. Sir Andrew did indeed have a close friendship with the Grand Duke, and much of his collection was acquired on his two Grand Tours of Europe, though as yet no archival evidence has been found to support the Fountaine collection was formed out of the Grand-Ducal collection.

The source of the decoration on one vase is taken from the circa 1549 engraving Destruction of Pharaoh's Host in the Red Sea by Domenico dalle Greche (d. 1558), after Titian. A woodcut print on paper depicting the same scene is in the collection of the British Museum, inv. no. 1980,U.9. The decoration on the other vase showing the Adoration is taken from the engraving by Nicholas Cochin (1610-1686). A print depicting the same scene is in the collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, inv. no. 2006.87.1.