{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O276612"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O276612/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2006AH2615/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2006AH2615/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"high","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2006AH2615","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":{"_iiif_pres":"https://iiif.vam.ac.uk/collections/O276612/manifest.json","_alt_iiif_pres":[]}},"record":{"systemNumber":"O276612","accessionNumber":"C.2445-1910","objectType":"Plate","titles":[],"summaryDescription":"This plate, painted in brightly-coloured enamels towards the end of the sixteenth century, would have been made to be one of a set. Each plate was decorated with a separate scene. Together they illustrated episodes from the story of Joseph as told in the Book of Genesis in the Bible. The enamelling workshop, which signed its products 'I.C.' for 'Jean Court', was fairly faithful to the prints it used as design sources. This scene of Joseph's wife Asenath with her new-born sons Manasseh and Ephraim follows a wood engraving by Pierre Eskrich in Guillaume Guéroult's 'Figures de la Bible illustrées de huictains françoys', published by Guillaume Roville in Lyons, France, in 1564. The decorative style of this plate and the use of translucent enamels in a variety of colours over foils both suggest a date of about 1575-1600.\n\nThe plate formed part of the generous bequest of George Salting (1835-1909), a millionaire born in Australia to Danish parents. He formed an  outstanding collection of decorative arts, much of which he lent to the Museum for display as he acquired new items. He left these works to the V&amp;A while his paintings went to the National Gallery and his prints and drawings to the British Museum.\r\n","physicalDescription":"Enamelled plate with shallow well painted in colours on a dark ground with an episode from the Biblical account of Joseph as told in the Book of Genesis, chapter 41. The scene shown relates specifically to verses 50-52 in which the Egyptian woman, Asenath (daughter of Potiphera, priest of On), wife of Joseph, gives birth to their sons Manasseh and Ephraim.            \r\n\r\nThe scene derives from from a print by Pierre Eskrich for Guillaume Guéroult's 'Figures de la Bible illustrées de huictains françoys', published by  Guillaume Roville in Lyons in 1564. To the left, Asenath, in blue, lies in a four-poster bed in a grand architectural setting. A servant or midwife tends to her and in the background a barefooted figure carrying a bowl, enters the room. Servants and nursemaids tend to the new-borns, washing them and keeping them warm by a roaring fire. A small white dog gambols nearby.\r\n\r\nThe well of the plate is edged with gilded interlaced foliate ornament while the border is decorated with grotesques (including faces swathed in headdresses, faces with abnormally large ears, and armless demi-figures with serpentine tails) and two-handled vases. The rim is painted white. The back of the plate is decorated with a border of gilded leaves and grisaille strapwork between which are term figures and grotesque flesh-coloured faces. The strapwork also  bears the initials 'I.C.' in black. Features such as the faces in headdresses on the front border and the formal interlaced gilded decoration derive from 'Moresque' ornament for goldsmiths' work such as that designed by Peter Flötner in Nuremberg and Bathazar van den Bos in Antwerp.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"de Court, Jean","id":"A18331"},"association":{"text":"maker","id":"x40240"},"note":"or workshop"}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"copper","id":"AAT11020"}],"techniques":[{"text":"enamelled","id":"x30139"},{"text":"gilded","id":"AAT53789"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Copper, painted in coloured enamels and gilded and with coloured translucent enamels over foils.","categories":[{"text":"Enamels","id":"THES48876"}],"styles":[],"collectionCode":{"text":"CER","id":"THES48594"},"images":["2006AH2615"],"imageResolution":"high","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"009","id":"THES399697"},"free":"","case":"","shelf":"","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"Plate","id":""}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"Limoges","id":"x32604"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"ca. 1575 - 1600","earliest":"1570-01-01","latest":"1600-12-31"},"association":{"text":"made","id":"x28654"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[{"object":{"text":"8424-1863","id":"O166379"},"association":""},{"object":{"text":"8425-1863","id":"O166376"},"association":""},{"object":{"text":"C.488-1921","id":"O276610"},"association":""}],"creditLine":"Bequeathed by George Salting, Esq.","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Diameter","value":"19.8","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"20/09/2012","earliest":"2012-09-20","latest":"2012-09-20"},"part":"","note":"Measured"},{"dimension":"Height","value":"2.5","unit":"cm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[{"content":"'XLI', in gold","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"At top background of scene, over 'wall'."},{"content":"'I.C.', in black","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"On the strapwork decoration on the reverse of the plate"}],"objectHistory":"Bequeathed to the Museum by George Salting (1835-1909). Born to Danish parents in Australia, Salting was a millionaire who formed an outstanding collection of decorative arts, much of which he lent to the Museum for display and then left to the Museum. His paintings went to the National Gallery and his prints and drawings to the British Museum.\r\n\r\nThe identity of the master enameller variously signing his work 'Jean Court', 'Jean de Court', 'Jean Court dit Vigier', or by the initials 'I.C.', 'IDC' and 'ICDV' has caused confusion for many years. Some hold him to be one and the same man while archival sources indicate that there may have been two or even three separate enamellers working in Limoges with variations of this name during the second half of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Whether they all collaborated in one single workshop founded by Jean Court dit Vigier is unclear. This enameller, active ca. 1555-85, carried out technically proficient work which was aesthetically precise and attractive and included polychrome portrait masterpieces for the court in Paris. The name Vigier indicates that he was a magistrate representing the viscount of Limousin in Limoges. He has been equated with the artist who became court painter to Charles IX, the painter to Charles  Bourbon, Prince de la Roche-sur-Yon in 1553 and to the widowed Mary, Queen of Scots, 1562-67. The poet Jacques Blanchon praised  this painter in an ode of 1583. While at court in Paris, other work could have been produced by his workshop such as the body of accomplished grisaille work in a highly decorative Mannerist style. His  workshop could also have been continued after his death. Polychrome plates usually signed 'I.C.' such as those from the Joseph series are  thought to have been produced towards the end of the sixteenth century on stylistic grounds. \n\nPierre Eskrich, on whose wood engraving this enamelled scene is based, was born in Paris in about 1520, the son of a goldsmith from Freiburg. Apprenticed to an embroiderer working for the Duke of Nevers, Pierre became a master embroiderer in Lyons. He was also a talented painter, producing a large number of well-observed watercolours of birds. As a Protestant, he was obliged to flee to Geneva in 1532. He returned finally to Lyon in 1564, converting to Roman Catholicism. He is thought to have lived until at least 1590.","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Plate, painted in enamels on copper and gilded with a scene from the Biblical story of Joseph, Jean de Court or workshop, Limoges, France, ca. 1575-1600.","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Sophie Baratte, Les Emaux peints de Limoges, Paris, Musee du Louvre, 2000"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Suzanne Higgott, The Wallace Collection, Catalogue of Glass and Limoges Painted Enamels, 2011"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Clare Vincent, Painted Enamels, in 'The Robert Lehman Collection: XV Decorative Arts', The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2012"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Maryvonne Beyssi-Cassan, Le métier d’émailleur à Limoges, XVIe-XVIIe siècle, Limoges, 2006 \r\n"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"H.P. Mitchell, 'The Limoges Enamels in the Salting Collection' in Burlington Magazine vol.20, no. 104, Nov. 1911."},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Neumann, Nicolas eds. <u>Lyon Renaissance: Arts et Humanisme</u>. Somogy éditions d’art: Paris, 2015. ISBN 9782757209912."}],"production":"Print series telling the story of Joseph lent themselves well to translating into decoration for individual enamelled plates. These plates could then be sold as a set, most likely of twelve. At least sixteen possible scenes were used implying that each set would include the standard key episodes but that there was some latitude in making up the remainder of the set from a choice of supplementary scenes. No complete set is known to be extant but there are examples of Joseph plates from the Jean de Court workshop in many public collections such as the Waddesdon Bequest at the British Museum; the Wallace Collection; the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; the Louvre Museum, Paris; The Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, Braunschweig; the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore; the St. Louis Art Museum; and a grisaille version in the Taft Museum, Cincinnati. Most of the prints used by the Jean de Court workshop were sourced from woodcuts by Bernard Salomon illustrating Claude Paradin's 'Quadrins historiques de la Bible' first published in Lyons by Jean de Tournes in 1553. However the scene used for this plate was from a series of wood engravings by Pierre Eskrich for Guillaume Guéroult's 'Figures de la Bible illustrées de huictains françoys', published by Guillaume Roville, Lyons, 1564.","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"Birth of Mannesseh and Ephraim","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[{"text":"Asenath","id":"AUTH335519"}],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[],"partNumbers":["C.2445-1910"],"accessionNumberNum":"2445","accessionNumberPrefix":"C","accessionYear":1910,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":["2016JE5695"],"recordModificationDate":"2026-01-03","recordCreationDate":"2009-06-24","availableToBook":true}}