This beautiful figure portrays Urania, the goddess of astronomy. My husband and I were smitten by her serene beauty, and we just had to have her. I hope our children, who own the figures we accumulate on their behalf, will love her as much.

This figure was made by the short-lived Lakin & Poole pot bank, that operated from 1791 to 1795. Lakin & Poole figures are readily recognizable. They are exceptionally well modeled and share common facial features--puffy cheeks (an undiagnosed  case of mumps?) and protruding eyes (thyroid disease?) among them.

Below is a figure of Ariadne, with the Lakin & Poole mark impressed into it. Ariadne and Urania (both about 11 inches tall) could be twin sisters. 

The figure shown above from John Hall's book is incorrectly described therein as Hygeia, the goddess of health. However, she is Ariadne, as seen on the titled example below, attributed to Lakin & Poole.

I have recorded nine Lakin & Poole models, and the paucity is not surprising given the partnership's brevity. Consistently, the bases are decorated in much the same way, titles (when present) are in the same hand, and the faces are recognizably Lakin & Poole. 

To my mind, the Lakin & Poole figures are the most well-modelled and loveliest of all early Staffordshire figures, yet they, like most of the earliest figures are not particularly popular with collectors, which is a great shame.

My next find is vastly different. Fast-forward thirty or so years to  around 1820, when this petite treasure was potted. The lady stands alongside her bee hive. The figure is just 4 inches tall and is unrecorded--indeed, I have yet to see bee-keeping portrayed in figural form. The object in her hand is probably a smoker, not a watering can. Smoke calms bees, so a smoker was a must-have item when invading their territory. 

There is no basis for attributing this little figure, but I would bet Walton made it. I am the first to wince at the manner in which anything and everything is glibly attributed to Walton, but the combination of decorative elements on the base may well be specific to Walton. I shall have to think about it some more, but I am thrilled to have found the figure, whoever made her. 

On the subject of bees, before the Victorian times, bees were housed in upturned straw baskets called skeps, such as you see here. The shape was conducive to the formation of the honey comb. The downside was that turning the skep over to collect the honey killed the bees or made them homeless, and so the beekeeper had to hunt down a new wild swarm and start from scratch.

It would have driven me crazy to not see what was going on in the skep. How did you know when the combs were full? Over time, gardeners resolved that problem by adding a peep hole. And they also worked out how to tap the honey without upending the skep and destroying the hive. 

So where did I find these figures? Urania came up at auction in the Staffordshire Potteries, and I like to think she has been there since her "birth" in around 1793. I was familiar with the figure form, having seen a Lakin & Poole Urania a long while ago. Until now, I had known of no others. The condition report seemed thorough,  and I detected nothing untoward on the high-resolution images. So I dragged myself out of bed in the middle of the night to bid on the auction--that  and the whole process of payment and arranging shipping can be a huge hassle. When the figure arrived I was thrilled. More usually, auction purchases come with an unanticipated problem. 

The beekeeper also came up at auction, but this time, I was not confident that the condition report was complete. The longer I looked at the images, the less certain I was that the head had not been restored. A friend scrutinized the images too, and we both had doubts. Had I been confident, I would have bid generously--but I could not face the prospect of buying a figure and finding it had a restored head. What would I be able to do with it in those circumstances? The trade has ways of moving mistakes on, but I would have been stuck with my mistake----so I did not bid.

As luck would have it, the figure landed up in the hands of a dealer whom I trust implicitly. The head was perfect, and I was over the moon at being able to add this little figure to our shelves, and at a price that was lower than I had been prepared to bid.  I share this with you so you understand the perils of bidding at auction, and to remind you that the peace of mind that comes with buying from a trusted source adds immeasurably to the pleasure of collecting.

These stunning busts  pay eternal tribute to a couple who put duty above all else--but circa 1830, there was, fortunately, no Oprah!

"She is doomed, poor, dear, innocent young creature to be my wife, ”So said Prince William, Duke of Clarence, ahead of his marriage to his German bride, Princess Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, some twenty-seven years his junior. The year was 1818, and William had settled into a comfortable domestic arrangement with the actress Dorothea Jordan, by whom he had fathered ten children. But the monarchy was in crisis. King George III was insane, and his aging sons lacked legitimate offspring. Lured by promises of parliamentary allowances, the princes rushed to negotiate suitable marriages. Deeply in debt, William, third in line to the throne, did his duty. He reluctantly settled on the homely but amiable Princess Adelaide, who proved to be accepting of his large illegitimate brood. 

These stunning busts are attributed to "Sherratt". They are almost ten inches tall. Their footed bases, each with a wreath motif along the front edge, are exclusive to "Sherratt," but I have not hitherto seen "Sherratt" bases painted in these rainbow colors. Note the rather confused spelling of Adelaide's name: "Addaerlene." 

I have long admired single examples of these busts on traditional "Sherratt" brown bases that reside in two private collections, an ocean apart. This time, the titles are on the bases rather than on the socles, and note yet another spelling of Adelaide's name: Adderlene.

I have also recorded one example of William on an unusual base that "Sherratt" sometimes used.

I must admit that I have been stalking William and Adelaide busts for some years, hoping a pair might exist somewhere on this planet. The pair at the start of this post finally appeared on the market late last year because, I am told, a cash-strapped museum cleaned out its cupboards. Collectors who give objects to museums: take note! 

​In my archive, I have the pair below, clearly from the same molds. They may have lost their foooted bases, but quite possibly they were made without them. I suspect that they too are "Sherratt," but I would not bet my life on that.

And then there is this lone bust of Addelaide, which was made without a footed base. Note that it is not of the same caliber as the previous examples. Adelaide's beaded necklace had been reduced to painted black lines. And her earrings, each a hoop of nine little beads on the previous busts, are now yellow dangling chunks. 

I would like to think that someone other than "Sherratt" made the bust of Adelaide, above. Maybe I am right, for it seems that the molds for both busts were copied or they passed into other hands. I have seen a few pairs like the pair below. They are sometimes described as porcelain, sometimes pottery. I haven't handled a pair, so I don't know, but the bodies may well be of a hybrid porcelaneous nature. They are very beautiful and well made, but they lack the charm that draws most pottery lovers.
​

As for the busts' design sources, I suspect Adelaide is after a drawing of the Queen published in Bell’s Weekly Messenger of 1830 (below).  William could be after any one of a number of prints. ​

How did William and Adelaide's story end? On July 13, 1818, they wed in a double ceremony with William’s brother, Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, the father of the future Queen Victoria. Marriage mellowed William, and he and Adelaide settled into a staid, parsimonious lifestyle. Despite multiple pregnancies, she produced no surviving children, and by the time William ascended the throne in 1830, Princess Victoria was his acknowledged heir. King William died on June 20, 1837, nursed to the end by the devoted Adelaide. She died on December 2, 1849.

The  pandemic has allowed me to spend even more time digging through catalogs, online resources, and the like, and I never cease to be amazed at what turns up. I have long been intrigued by the pottery group on the right, impressed WEDGWOOD and probably made by Ralph Wedgwood, circa 1795. Ralph was a plagiarist extraordinaire, and most of his figures are copies of his contemporaries' work. This is the only Wedgwood figure with a bocage, and for a long time a source has eluded me. Recently, I found the porcelain figure on the left, which sold at Bonhams in 2013.  

I wish I had a color picture of this lady in a top hat that was part of Green Valley's auction of the Kritzer estate. Again, I have yet to see another.

More recently, this little reading man went through auction at Bishop & Miller.  At the risk of being repetitive, I have yet to see another, and surely he had a female counterpart?

Of course, if you have a bigger budget and more room on your shelves, larger treasures await.....if  you can live long enough for them to come to market. In 1992, Sotheby's sold this large pearlware setter measuring 17 inches across. Yes, it has a companion model, colored differently, which last sold at Sotheby's in 1989.

If you have a little less space and want unusual pooches, you may want to wait for  this pair, which sold at Sotheby's in 2002.

These gorgeous deer with stunning flowers on their bocages have my vote. I don't know where they sold, but it was a long, long time ago.

Because I warned you recently of the pitfalls of buying from the trade, you may think that you have little to lose by shopping at auction instead. Think again. Remember, auctions are where dealers dump their mistakes. Also, auction houses are generalists, and most lack the expertise to give you a reliable condition report--in my experience, only one major auction house consistently gets full marks.  Whereas a dishonest/stupid dealer can usually be shamed --or enticed by the prospect of further business with you--into give you a refund, when the hammer comes down at auction, you are on your own.

Below is a figure group I photographed at a major auction many, many years ago. It appeals to those who want "cute" figures on their shelves, and I am sure it sold very, very well.

So what's wrong? Where do I begin? Once upon a time, a dealer had two elephants, their bocages lost. They probably looked like these (made by Enoch Wood).

What was the dealer to do? How to make a silk purse out of this sow's ear? Elephants are cute, but in this state, who would buy them? Perhaps the dealer contemplated adding bocages from other figures. You shudder, dear reader, but this has been done. Just recently, I spoke with a collector who concluded she had been duped in just this way.

But, in the instance of these two little pachyderms, the dealer had loftier ambitions. With the aid of a restorer, he/she created a figure group the likes of which the Potteries had never seen! As a base for this concoction, the restorer used the base from a Sherratt Flight and Return. Below you see a very nice example of such a group, with the base painted pink rather than blue.

The Flight and Return clearly had some good bocage with it, of the sort seen on the group above. The restorer used those bocage leaves to fabricate a bocage for his "masterpiece". The leaves above the elephants are arranged in a manner not seen on any early Staffordshire piece. Note the bocage trunk narrows suspiciously at the top, and the various shades of green on the leaves mask the glue job needed to hold it all together. 

​Which would you rather have: the humble little FRUIT GIRL at the top of this post of the "cute" and no-doubt-costly elephant group?

So how does a collector sleep at night?  The answer is simple. If you want figures of fine quality--big or small, modestly priced or costly, rare or ordinary--shop with a trustworthy dealer. You will rest easy knowing your purchase was not be akin to shredding your money.

I have contemplated writing this post for a very long time but, frankly, I have lacked the courage. Where to begin? In summary, I am sickened at the mix of stupidity and dishonesty pervading the antique pottery trade. I routinely see buyers been taken for suckers. I know you are thinking “eBay”, but eBay is not my primary concern. On the contrary, many eBay sellers try to list honestly because there are repercussions when a sale goes pear-shaped.
 
My concern focuses on established dealers with their own web sites. By and large, these ladies and gentleman are pleasant individuals, and their personalities endear them to their customers. It’s so much easier to part with money when you like the recipient, isn’t it? But if you want to be sure of what you are buying, you need your dealer to be both clever enough to detect any issues and honest enough to tell you about them. Of the many charming dealers in early figures, in my experience only two definitely check both boxes, and a third comes close. For the rest, buyer beware.
 
Yes, we all make mistakes, and we learn from them. But I often wonder how people who have spent their lives dealing in early pottery can make the “mistakes” that I see them make. Surely it can’t be ignorance? Can anyone really be that stupid? Where does ignorance end and the dishonesty begin?
 
Let me give you examples of issues I have encountered recently. The BADA (British Antique Dealers” Association) presents itself as the bastion of integrity in the antiques trade. Recently, I noticed a group listed on the BADA site. It comprised a male and a female figure before a bocage. The main problem was that the original male figure had been lost, and a replacement of the wrong form had been put in his place. There was no mention of this in the description, and the piece was priced for perfection. If this were not bad enough, the US dealer who was selling this assembled object had also listed a pair of late Victorian (Kent factory) deer as made circa 1825.
 
What was I to do? Instead of reporting this to BADA, I emailed the dealer, making him aware, as nicely as possible, of my concerns about his BADA listings. I received a curt reply, and the next week he removed both listings from the BADA site. BUT, many weeks later, those same problem objects remain on his own site. And as today, both are also on 1stDibs, where you can buy both for the princely sum of $5,000….but good luck when you want to sell them. I would not give you 50 cents for either.
 
I routinely encounter alterations that deceive. Last year, I was extremely upset to see two small figures altered to make a matching pair. When I challenged this, the explanation left me with more questions than answers. The dealer assured me that the figures had gone into his personal collection, so I let it go. Interestingly, he sent me a picture of the offending pair proudly displayed amidst his Kent figures!
 
Just this month, a pair of small figures sold very quickly at a high price, and “cuteness” may have been part of their appeal. I have been around long enough to know that the bocages were oversized for the figures. And I know without a shadow of doubt that the bocages are not original to the figures. The figures lost their bocages and a restorer stuck pieces of bocage from other figures onto the stumps. Any trained naked eye can detect this, but there was no mention of this major alteration in the description. In other words, the new owner parted with a hefty sum of money and acquired four figures that had been reassembled into two. I do hope he/she was made aware of this, but I suspect not.
 
When you see something that appeals to your eye, the rational part of your brain takes a back seat. I know this because it happens to me too! But when you want to sell, you have a problem. In my experience, those same dealers who profess to see no issues when selling acquire eagle-eyed powers of detection when buying. Moral of the story: ask when you buy, and insist that ALL issues be detailed on your receipt. Never trust, always verify.
 
This month, Bonhams is selling a menagerie. I first encountered this very menagerie in 2003 at Christie’s in New York. Every menagerie (like most pieces of early pottery) has issues, and this menagerie had a great many that Christie’s condition report detailed. In a room full of collectors, unenthusiastic bidding fell to two individuals, and ultimately it sold to the trade, and then to a collector in 2004.
 

I wonder if the person who bought this menagerie in 2004 was aware of all its issues. Quite possibly, the buyer looked, fell in love, and asked nothing. But now that it is time to sell, all is laid bare.
 
Believe me, my collection has its share of restoration, and some things bought complacently in my early days from friendly dealers have issues that I was not informed of at the time, despite asking. Now, I don’t expect perfection in my purchases, but I do want to know what I am buying.
 
I have learned, and am still learning from my mistakes. To know what you are buying:

• Ask your dealer probing questions before you buy. I have seen umpteen figures change hands with little discussion of condition. “I trust him,” says the collector, as he/she basks in the delight of that purchase. But “he/she never told me,” complains the collector, many years later when the truth is revealed. Frankly, I am not sure a dealer is obligated to tell you if you don’t ask!
• Insist that your receipt detail all restoration.
• Buy a pair of high-power reading glasses and check out your purchase in strong light. Be paranoid. Assume all is not perfect. Think about everything that could have been done. Can you detect that the bocage, a head, or a limb might have been replaced? Look for changes in color at the points of joins. Feel for restoration, which usually feels a little warmer and stickier to the touch. And look for changes in the crazing.

If you are unsure, ask me or someone else…ideally before you buy. It’s fine to buy a restored piece, but the price must reflect major issues. Buying a reproduction….well, that’s another story. I want to be sure that you know what you are buying, that you don’t buy in haste and repent at your leisure.

Every early Staffordshire pottery figure tells a tale, and the tale I am about to recount is one I have told in my books, but I tell it here again because there is new development in the story. A twist in the tale---or is it in the tail of the yarn?

It all began many years ago, when my friend Nick Burton helped me acquire this stunning "Sherratt" figure at auction.

As you see, the figure is titled MENAGERIE, and I was puzzled because, as we well know, a menagerie looks more like this.

Then around midnight one night, I stumbled across a broadside in the National Library of Scotland. Dramatically titled "FEARFUL ACCIDENT! FOUR LIVES LOST," it recounted the gory happenings of February 1834, when the menagerie lion and tiger escaped during the night from Wombwell's menagerie. The animals attacked and killed four people, including a woman with a child in her arms.

Suddenly, the title MENAGERIE on my figure group made sense. This was the tiger who escaped, and the mother and child were its victims. I was so excited with my discovery, but who was there to tell, besides the dogs sleeping at my feet?
The broadside cited the Northumberland Herald as the source of the story, and I could not wait to get to London, where I accessed the British Library's microfilm copies of the newspaper and found the same account, almost word for word.

The news of this bloody animal misadventure spread like lightening across Britain because newspaper after newspaper printed the same account. As the disaster was said to have happened in Worksworth, just a stone's throw from the Potteries, it is not surprising that it inspired Staffordshire's potters to capture the horror of it in clay. And with my new-found knowledge and with the help of those potters, the tale unravelled.
​
​What of the other two victims? The report tells us that one was a young boy, and here he is, again courtesy of "Sherratt".

In the figure group below, we have another depiction of events. This time, the lion is clawing the mother---the very same figure that the tiger is mauling in my MENAGERIE group.

What of the fourth victim? Newspaper reports did not identify the fourth victim, but the figure group below suggests that he was believed to be a black man.

The two Sherratt figure groups below again confirm that the fourth victim was indeed thought to be a black man. Lest you doubt it, the second group is titled THE DEATH OF A NEGRO, but, sadly the man has been lost....or perhaps he is in the beast's tummy. (By the way, don't let the spots distract you. In the early nineteenth century, there was still much confusion and ignorance as to which Big Cat was which!)

Each of these figures is known from only one example. But the joy of collecting is that you just never know what will turn up next. Recently, I was made aware of a large "Sherratt" tiger (on the scale of the tiger in Death of Munrow groups) with a black man in his jaws. That treasure has resided in the Czech Republic for around a century!

Similarly, the joy of researching is that you just never know what will be unearthed. Nowadays, British newspapers are searchable online, so today I would be able to access the story of the menagerie escape in a few minutes--no need to fly to London and spend hours scrutinizing microfilm. And so I decided to research it yet again. Sure enough, the story appears in umpteen publications across Britain in late February/early March 1834.  But fast forward another month or so, here comes the twist in the tale: very brief retractions appear in those same newspapers. 

It seems the story was fake news, a puff piece that the menagerist George Wombwell planted to drum up excitement and boost attendance at his show. Attitudes then were very different from those that prevail today, and animals that had taken four human lives were a drawcard. Add to that, many visitors secretly hoped to witness another gory mishap!

Although the retractions were published with as little research as the original story, I concede that the escapes of 1834 were almost certainly fake news. But the men who captured in clay the lion, the tiger, and their four victims did not know that. The tale fired their imaginations and inspired the creation of a handful of truly fabulous figures groups.

In the lethargy of these lazy lockdown days, I struggle to write anything worth reading. But as Dallas will be besieged by COVID for a good while longer, I must snap out of it!  In my defense, the almost  total disappearance of auctions for many weeks means that little fresh has come to market, but that is gradually changing, and I am finding fodder for thought daily.

Last month, this unusual little figure came up at Woolley and Wallis. Most auction houses would have lumped it into a lot with unremarkable figures, but, to their credit, Woolley and Wallis gave this little lady a lot of her own. She is special because she is a Leeds Pottery figure, and those are almost as rare as hen's teeth today. Although unmarked, bidders recognized her worthiness, and she did rather well.

I know this figure from the pair below, photographed from a book or magazine.  I bought the Woolley and Wallis figure and hope some day to find the male figure to make the pair.

I have covered Leeds Pottery figures previously, so if you type LEEDS POTTERY into the search box at the top of this page, you can access those articles. I have three other Leeds figures in my collection, and, if you look at their faces, below, you can't help but notice the strong family resemblance. Those little pinched faces are hard to forget!

Note to self: other points of similarity are the use of dotted dress pattens and watery brown enamels on the bases. Perhaps these will open my eyes to other Leeds figures in the future. No photo can ever adequately convey their delicate  beauty, and they top my list of favorites, just one notch ahead of Neale figures.

There are plenty of other unusual figures surfacing as Britain gets up to speed. John Howard, who never seemed to miss a beat right through the COVID shutdown, added this pair of cows recently. How nice to see these as a true pair.

And if cows aren't your thing, John also has a good-looking pair of dogs.

If animals also don't push your button, what's not to like about this sweet pair portraying  the Sailor's Farewell and the Sailor's Return, now in the stock of Mears & Boyer?  Eye candy, aren't they? It's so unusual to find a pair with their bocages intact and with the original blue enameling to the coats. Too often the blue has flaked, and the restoration is usually jarringly bright.

Does the lovely figure below, in the stock of Andrew Dando, remind you of some other figure form? 

At the low end of the price spectrum, there are some interesting small figures floating around. I have not previously seen this tiny version of a plump, bare-breasted Venus, height 6.5 inches.

The petite version of the Vicar and Moses, below left,  is another that  I have not seen hitherto. Although the vicar has the same facial features as his larger counterpart, Moses is an entirely new creation.

The unusual always sparks my interest, and the decoration on the  base on the deer at the left fits the bill. Similarly, the crude but charming sheep on the right. I can't recall seeing a sheep on a yellow base previously.

This primitive, immodest, and rather striking Virgin Mary caught my eye.

She is decorated in underglaze colors, as are the one or two other examples I have encountered (see http://www.earlystaffordshirefigures.com/107-virgin-mary.html), but here the colors are particularly bright and pretty, and the base is of a different form.

And last but not least among the unusual items I have seen of late  are these three pearlware stoups, all in the stock of Elinor Penna. Very colorful, aren't they?

So, as always, keep your eyes open. You just never know what will turn up next!

Staffordshire figures portraying classical figures are endlessly fascinating, but they can also be rather perplexing. Case in point are these two pearlware beauties,  the only known examples of their kind. Both are around 13 inches tall, and the silver luster is quite exquisite. 

But for the silver luster, I might have dated these figures to around 1800, but as silver lustering was only adopted commercially from 1805, I suspect these figures were made around 1805 or shortly after. They depict Calliope, the muse of epic poetry. The title on the spine of each book confirms this--- "OVID VOL 4" in one case and  "OVID Vol 5" in the other.

​Simple enough so far isn't it? But the plot thickens. The stunningly impressive and unique figure below is almost 15 inches tall. She has changed hands through time described as Metis, who was the goddess of deep thought and wisdom. As the ancients believed Metis to be the wisest of all beings, it is appropriate that she has a large book at her side.

Although there are resemblances between the figures of Metis and Calliope, when I wrote Staffordshire Figures 1780-1840, Volume 4, I included separate chapters for each of the ladies.......but, given their similarities, I now wonder whether the figure of Metis above is  Calliope rather than Metis! 

What of other figures on the subject? My Volume 4 describes the sweet figure bellow as Metis. She is only 6 inches tall and can be attributed to the Brown Base Group The owner had always thought her to be Metis, and perhaps she is...but I can't help noticing that she is pointing to her tome in much the same manner as the figures of Calliope do. Is she not Calliope too?

I recently noted this small figure on the same theme that went through auction. She too is pointing at her book, so I suspect she too is Calliope.

I haven't located an ancient statue of either lady that resembles any of these figures closely enough to have been its design source, so I am fumbling in the dark on this one. If only the figures were titled! But, with hindsight, if I were to do my books again (perish the thought!!), I would probably call ALL these ladies Calliope. In the year 2020, hindsight is 2020.

As the coronavirus pandemic marches on, I trust you are reading this in the comfort and safety of your home. How very privileged we are to be able to shelter in place, to wash our hands! My heart bleeds for the millions of helpless people in the townships of my homeland, South Africa, who lack such necessities. Daily, they scrounge for food and pray for survival.

Of course, the pottery world has ground to a halt, but we collectors have the luxury of savoring the treasures we already own. Digging through the folder of items I intend adding to earlystaffordshirefigures.com, I thought this large pooch and his two unlikely companions particularly unusual.

The group is BIG..a whipping sixteen inches across...and it sold a while ago at Sotheby's New York. The colors are underglaze and the group may have been made in Yorkshire rather than Staffordshire. It previously belonged to the iconic designer Mario Buatta, but I trust that its new owner is very pleased to have been able to give it a new home.

​Also unusual is this impressive figure, which sold at auction in the UK not so long ago.

I have no clue as to her identity, but I have recorded another figure from the same molds (below left) as well as the companion figure (below right). 

I had almost decided that these languidly posed ladies were classical portrayals of something or other, when along came the lady below. I suspect she is from the same pot bank--or, at very least, she was modeled by the same hand--but here the subject oozes domesticity. I have yet to see a classical figure holding a cat!

The companion model is a very English gentleman with the same dog at his side. Each is known only from the example shown here, but wouldn't they look fabulous side by side?

Believe it or not, there is yet another iteration of this theme. The particularly ugly fellow below in a rather unmanly pose probably portrays a theatrical character.

His female companion is very like one of the first females we looked at.

Placed side by side, the columns differ and there are some other obvious differences, but the figures seem to share many common features--perhaps even common molds. Possibly one or both of these ladies portray a theatrical figure. Who knows? But, as always, guessing is part of the fun.

One other mystery item caught my eye: the man on the very pretty plaque below is a real crosspatch. What a grouch! The modeler deliberately and skillfully ensured that anger and irritability oozed out of his every pore. Any idea who he might be?  If you know, please share....and please stay safe!

Last summer, this large pearlware plaque popped onto John Howard's site. I knew at once that I "needed" to buy it (reason to follow!), but, sadly, I am a too-disciplined collector, so before I could allow myself that luxury, I had to understand the plaque, decipher its subject, and attempt to find a design source.

To unravel the mystery, I started with the putto on horseback. He holds a two-faced mask, one face looking forward and the other back. This represents Janus, the god of beginnings and endings----yes, the very person for whom the month of January is appropriately named.

​But I was on the wrong track. I should have instead looked first at the youth sitting beneath a grapevine. This, it turned out, is is the Roman god Bacchus, the god of wine, who was known to the Greeks as Dionysus. He was associated with fertility, ritual madness, and religious ecstasy. ​Dionysus/Bacchus is said to have returned to Greece triumphantly from his travels in India and the East, where he had spread his wine culture. He came to be considered the founder of the triumphal procession, and the Triumph of Bacchus has been depicted in art from ancient times.

​Mystery solved. The plaque portrays the Triumph of Bacchus, and we have the skilled modeler William Hackwood to thank for its design. In 1770, working for Josiah Wedgwood, Hackwood modeled a jasper plaque depicting the Triumph of Bacchus. And Hackwood’s design is the direct source for the pearlware plaque.

​The Hackwood plaque, below, shows Bacchus seated in a horse-drawn chariot with his older companion and tutor, the satyr Silenus at his side.  A putto astride one of the horses carries a two-faced mask symbolic of Janus, whose presence would have marked the end of a journey and a new start. An identical motif is on a rectangular Wedgwood plaque in the Wedgwood Museum (no. 5139) that Wedgwood made at around the same time as the British Museum’s medallion.

The copper luster on the pearlware plaque is unusual for a plaque of this period, and it has  been applied lightly and uneventy over green enamels.  It is more subtle than it appears under the harsh glare of photographic lighting.

I was drawn to the Bacchus plaque because it is a companion to one of the prettiest plaques in our collection. That plaque, shown below, portrays Cybele. It is formed in the same manner, and it too measures 9.2" across the top. 

I believe this plaque was intended to portray the Triumph of Cybele. While I can find no specific tale of triumph for Cybele, she too is depicted, at least from the Renaissance, riding trumphantly in a chariot pulled by lions, the beasts traditionally associated with her. When Hackwood modeled his Triumph of Bacchus plaque, he also modeled another  depicting the  the Triumph of Cybele. Hackwood was well-versed in the classics and would have been aware of the many parallels between the two deities and their cults. Both were worshipped ecstatically with strong wine and wild dancing bordering on insanity. And both were associated with nature and ferocious animals. Lions typically pull Cybele’s chariot, while leopards or panthers usually draw Bacchus’s.   
​
Unfortunately, Hackwood's Triumph of Cybele, shown below, is not the design source for the pearlware plaque on that theme, so my search for this continues.

Notably, my Cybele plaque is modeled in high relief and is very prettily painted.

From the reverse, the Cybele plaque is formed in the same manner as the Bacchus plaque.

Both the Cybele and Bacchus plaques are almost certainly from the same pot bank as another pair of plaques in our collection, bought very many years ago from John Howard.

The figures portray the unfortunate Princess Charlotte, who died in childbirth, and her husband, Prince Leopold. The plaques are in astonishingly high relief, and the rims are gilded, perhaps as a nod to the importance of their royal subjects. I believe all the plaques shown here were made in the 1800-1820 period.

In the internet age, auctioneers have become hybrid retailers-wholesalers. Recently, Sotheby's took a step into what is definitely retail space with its new direct selling platform, Sotheby's Home. You can access it at Sotheby'shome.com.

Good news: the Sotheby's Home site has just added a selection of early figures from a private American collection. Searching "Staffordshire" or "pearlware" will pull them up. Pricing is aggressive, and offers are accepted. Plus there is an additional discount of 15%.

I welcome Sotheby's Home as space for selling good figures that don't quite make the price cut-off for single lots at auction---and don't we all hate it when multiple figures are bunched into a lot just to make that minimum?  

Another big positive: condition reports. In my experience, Sotheby's condition reports are the best. I have not yet been disappointed in one, and I certainly cannot say the same about condition reports from most other auction houses or most dealers.