Physical description
Drugjar of tin-glazed earthenware, painted in colours. The inscription 'DIA CHASSIA' is painted on a horizontal label, cutting across a panel enclosed by a large oval wreath of green foliage and yellow fruit tied with green ribbons. Above the label is a youth in costume of the period seated on a bench braying drugs in a mortar; below it a monster swallowing a naked boy. The base is incised, possibly with a pharmacy mark.
Place of Origin
Deruta, Italy (made)
Date
about 1507 (made)
Materials and Techniques
Tin-glazed earthenware, painted in colours
Marks and inscriptions
'DIA CHASSIA' electuary of cassia
£ 3 3 pounds?
Dimensions
Height: 22.4 cm, Diameter: 13 cm, Weight: 1 kg
Object history note
This jar belongs to the same set as 668-1884 (Rackham catalogue 404)
Castellani Sale Cat., Rome, 1 April 1884, Lot 84; Bardini Sale Cat., Christie's, 5 June 1899, French ed., pl.6, no.105.
Historical context note
This jar was used for storing drugs. It would have been part of a set of similar jars for different drugs, belonging to a pharmacy. The constriction just underneath the rim was used to close the pot off with a piece of parchment or paper and a string. A few similar jars, probably from the same set, have survived., one is dated 1507.
This pot depicts a youth in comtemporaty dress braying drugs with a pestle in a large mortar of the type which was used by apothecaries of the Renaissance period.
Descriptive line
Drug-jar, tin-glazed earthenware, painted in colours and inscription 'DIA CHASSIA'
Bibliographic References (Citation, Note/Abstract, NAL no)
Ballardini, G., Corpus della maiolica Italiana,Vol. I, figs 34, 35
A similar drugjar, dated 1507, in the Ghompret Collecion is illustrated
Bojani, G.C., C. Ravanelli Guidotti, A. Fanfani, La donazione Galeazzo Cora: ceramiche dal medioevo al XIX secolo, Milano, 1985, p. 182, cat 451
A wet-drug jar from the same set.
Biscontini Ugolini, Grazia (Ed), I Vasi da farmacia nella collezione Bayer: Pharmacy jars in the Bayer Collection, Milan, 1997, cat. 9, pp. 60-61
Another jar of this set, almost identical to our, but with incription: 'LOGH SANUM'.
Falke, O. von, Pringsheim Collection, figs. 106-109, III
Two more drug-jars, probably belongeing to the same set are illustrated.
R. Drey, Apothecary Jars: pharmaceutical pottery and porcelain in Europe and the East 1150-1850, London, 1978, p. 39, fig. 11C
Illustrates a similar jar, probably form the same set in the Lyon Museum, Gillet Collection.
Fiocco, Gherardi & L. Sfeir-Fakhri, Majoliques Italiennes du Musée des Arts Décoratifs de Lyon: Collection Gillet, Dijon, 2001, no. 56-59
Illustrate similar jars, probably form the same set in the Lyon Museum, Gillet Collection. One of these is dated 1507.
Production Note
A few similar jars, probably from the same set, have survived; some are dated 1507.
Collection code
CER
