A Rare Meissen Armorial Gilt-Metal-Mounted Footed Stand from The Sulkowski Service, Circa 1735-38 |

moulded with a Sulkowski Ozier basketwork border around the rim, painted four times with the arms of Graf Alexander Joseph von Sulkowski and his wife Maria Anna Freiin von Stein zu Jettingen and scattered indianische Blumen, mounted on a flared, lobed foot moulded with twelve basketwork panels and gilt-edged rims, contemporary gilt-metal mounts, crossed swords mark in underglaze-blue, impressed Dreher's mark of a cross and four dots for Andreas Schiefer

Width 10 5/8 in.; Height 3 3/4 in.

27.2 cm.; 9.5 cm.

Horst Reber, Eine Rheinische Porzellan-Sammlung, Darmstadt, 2006, vol. I, pp. 76-77

Catalogue note
The Sulkowski service was the first magnificent armorial service to be ordered from the Meissen factory, pre-dating the Swan Service by several years.

Alexander Joseph Graf von Sulkowski (1695-1762) was born into a prominent Polish noble family and would become an influential minister during the reign of Augustus III. He began service in the Royal Court as a page and from 1711, he was raised in the household of the Electoral Prince Friedrich Augustus, the heir of Augustus the Strong. In 1732, he was raised to a count and in 1735 he took command of the King's troops in Poland. He married twice, firstly in 1728 to Baroness Maria Franziska von Stein zu Jettingen (1712-41) with whom he had seven children and whose arms also appear on the service.

In the specification prepared on February 8, 1738, recording the pieces of the incomplete 'Sulkowski' service delivered to the Japanese Palace, '6 Stück Credenz Teller' were listed (published by Gunter Reinheckel, Meissener Prunkservice, Stuttgart, 1989, n. 102, p. 197-198).

The Sulkowski service was the subject one of the very earliest scholarly monographs on Meissen porcelain, when it was published by Julius Lessing in 1888, 'Das Porzellangeschirr Sulkowski', Kunstgewerbeblatt, vol. 4, pp. 43-8. Much of the service was apparently sold shortly afterwards, though a large portion was preserved in the family home until it was sold at Sotheby's London, under the designation 'The Property of a Lady of Title', 23 May 1967, lots 29-50; two such footed stands, lots 43 and 44, were included in the sale. Another footed stand from the service was sold by Bonhams London, 7 December 2022, lot 43.

Cranfield University used non-invasive X-ray fluorescence (XRF) for this lot to screen the green enamel for chromium, which was not detected, a result consistent with 18th century manufacture.
Additional Notices & Disclaimers

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