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Plate: the Creation of Eve

On display in:

Smoking Room

Order image © All images subject to copyright

artist or maker

Reymond, Pierre (b.c 1513, d.c 1584)

after engraving by Lucas van Leyden (b.c 1494, d.1533)

Date

1560

Place of production

  • Limoges, France

Medium

  • copper, enamel and gold

Type of object

  • plates (dishes)

Accession number

2962

Plate enamelled in grisaille with flesh tones and gold highlights depicting the creation of Eve out of Adam's rib by God. The border has a freize of symmetrical grotesques between oval cartouches which house the inscriptions. On the reverse, a bust of a bearded man in profile against a black background scattered with gold dots and surrounded by a double border, strapwork and leaf scrolls.

In 1560, Pierre Reymond made a service depicting scenes from the Biblical Book of Genesis. This is one of four plates from the service that survive. They are noted for their unusual rendering of solid figures which Reymond no doubt took from the source prints by Lucas van Leyden.

Commentary

Two further plates are in the Louvre, Paris (inv. nos OA6190 & OA6191) and one is in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London (inv. no. C 2434-1910). An oval dish with the Creation of Eve, the same inscription, and signed PR, was previously at Luton Hoo. Reymond used scenes taken from the Book of Genesis for several ewer stands, one of which is also at Waddesdon (acc. no. 5348).

Phillippa Plock, 2016

Physical description

Dimensions (mm) / weight (mg)

15 x 192 dia.

Marks

P. R
Maker's mark
[centre right]

1560
Date letter
[centre left]

H.30
Owner's mark
[oval label noted in object file - now removed, Betty de Rothshild's inventory mark]

HH5
Owner's mark
[oval label noted in object file, now removed]

Inscriptions

GENESE
Inscription
[upper centre]

II
Inscription
[lower centre]

Labels

Einsatzstab RR
R [3883?]
Printed label
[reverse, on old photograph, now removed]

History

Provenance

  • Acquired by Baron James de Rothschild (b.1792, d.1868) before 1867; inherited by his wife Baroness Betty de Rothschild (b.1805, d.1886); by descent to her son Baron Edmond de Rothschild (b.1845, d.1934); by descent to his son James de Rothschild (b.1878, d.1957); accepted by The Treasury Solicitor in lieu of taxes on the Estate of Mr James de Rothschild in 1963; given to Waddesdon (National Trust) in 1990.

Exhibition history

  • 'Exposition Universelle', Paris, 1867, no. 2974, lent by Baron James de Rothschild

Collection

  • Waddesdon (National Trust)
  • Accepted by HM Government in lieu of inheritance tax and allocated to the National Trust for display at Waddesdon Manor, 1963
Bibliography

Bibliography

  • R J Charleston, Madeleine Marcheix, Michael Archer, Anthony Blunt; Glass and Enamels: The James A de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor; Fribourg; Office du Livre; 1977; pp. 348-50, cat. no. 8, ill.
  • Sophie Baratte; Les Emaux peints de Limoges: Musée du Louvre. Département des objets d'art; Paris; Éditions de la Réunion des musées nationaux; 2000; p. 208.

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