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Tile fragment: C.130-1927

Object information

Current Location: In storage

Maker(s)

Maker: Unknown

Entities

Categories

Description

Top-left corner of a square tile from the Palazzo Petrucci. Cream earthenware, tin-glazed on the upper surface. Painted in dark blue, green, yellow, orange, brownish-red, and, on the border tile, black.
The tile is decorated with the top left corner of a shield, and a similar border with a yellow crescent reserved in dark blue in the spandrel.

Notes

History note: Purportedly purchased in Siena by F. Leverton Harris.

Legal notes

F. Leverton Harris Bequest

Measurements and weight

Depth: 2.1 cm
Height: 7.5 cm
Width: 9.2 cm

Place(s) associated

  • Siena ⪼ Tuscany ⪼ Italy

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Bequeathed (1926) by Harris, Frederick Leverton

Dating

16th Century
Renaissance
Production date: circa AD 1509

Note

This tile fragments (and C.127, C.128, C.129-1927) and another border tile fragment which has lost most of its glaze (C.131-1927) formed part of a tile pavement commissioned by Pandolfo Petrucci for the principal room in his palazzo in Siena. The room is thought to have been decorated between 1508 and Petrucci's death in 1512, and three of the tiles are dated 1509. The pavement comprises pentagonal tiles of two sizes, square tiles and rectangular border tiles. Some of the square tiles are decorated with the quartered arms of Piccolomini and Petrucci, with trophies, or with figures in landscapes reminiscent of those by Pinturicchio, Signorelli and Genga. The majority are decorated with grotesques, and the pavement as a whole is one of the most outstanding illustrations of this genre on early sixteenth-century maiolica. Over 300 tiles from the pavement are in the Victoria and Albert Museum, and there are 17 in the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg. When cataloguing that collection Rasmussen listed a number of others.

School or Style

Renaissance

Components of the work

Decoration composed of high-temperature colours ( dark blue, green, yellow, orange, brownish-red, and black) tin-glaze

Materials used in production

Earthenware

References and bibliographic entries

Identification numbers

Accession number: C.130-1927
Primary reference Number: 48120
Stable URI

Audit data

Created: Saturday 6 August 2011 Updated: Monday 18 December 2023 Last processed: Monday 18 December 2023

Associated departments & institutions

Owner or interested party: The Fitzwilliam Museum
Associated department: Applied Arts

Citation for print

This record can be cited in the Harvard Bibliographic style using the text below:

The Fitzwilliam Museum (2024) "Tile fragment" Web page available at: https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/48120 Accessed: 2024-12-22 20:36:11

Citation for Wikipedia

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{{cite web|url=https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/48120 |title=Tile fragment |author=The Fitzwilliam Museum|accessdate=2024-12-22 20:36:11|publisher=The University of Cambridge}}

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