Lot 114. A pair of Sèvres bottle coolers from a service commissioned by Madame du Barry, circa 1770; 18.5cm and 18.7cm high. Estimate: £60,000-80,000 (€ 70,000 - 93,000). Photo: Bonhams.

LONDON.- An exceptionally rare pair of Sèvres bottle coolers from a service commissioned by Madame du Barry, the final maîtresse-en-titre of Louis XV, will be offered at Bonhams Fine European Ceramics sale in London on Wednesday 4 December. The pair is estimated at £60,000-80,000.

Lot 114. A pair of Sèvres bottle coolers from a service commissioned by Madame du Barry, circa 1770; 18.5cm and 18.7cm high. Estimate: £60,000-80,000 (€ 70,000 - 93,000). Photo: Bonhams.

Seaux à bouteille, possibly painted by Charles-Nicolas Dodin, each side reserved with a gilt-edged circular medallion depicting a seated putto in a landscape with attributes of Music, Poetry, War and Peace, the putto emblematic of Poetry holding a scroll with the inscription 'Ode sur le mariage de M le Dauphin. le 16 May 1770 [Ode on the marriage of the Dauphin. the 16 May 1770], each panel within a band of laurel leaves with berries, further wreaths to the sides connected by trailing berried laurel leaves, all on a turquoise fond Taillandier, the scrolling shell handles heightened in gilding, interlaced LL monograms in blue, incised LF and cd(?) (minute chips to tip edges of handles).

Provenance:: Purchased by Jeanne Bécu, Comtesse du Barry, on 1 September 1770;
Acquired by the present owner by 1980.

Note: The service was purchased by Madame Du Barry on 1st September 1770 and is included in the inventory of 24 August 1794 of the contents of the château de Louveciennes. See David Peters, Sèvres Plates and Services of the 18th Century (2005), II, pp. 435f., for a full discussion of the service, of which twelve plates are in the Royal Collection (acquired by George IV, see G. de Bellaigue, French Porcelain the the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen (2009), II, cat. no. 156). A compotier coquille was sold in these rooms, 5 July 2018, lot 204.

The 1770 sale ledgers of the service lists 3 seaux à bouteille at a price of 240 livres each. The third seau à bouteille from the service was in the collection of Baron Achille Seillière, Chateau de Mello, sold at Sale Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 9 March 1911, lot 41 (part), then at Christie's London, 6 October 1986, lot 254 and again at Christie's New York, 19 May 2004. A group of similarly decorated pieces not part of the service are also known, some of which were in the same sale in Paris in 1911. Two bottle coolers from this group were sold at Christie's London, 1 July 1985, lot 42, and are now in the Powerhouse Museum (part of the Museum of Applied Arts) in Sydney. The decoration differs in both the size of the panels with putti, which are much larger and fill almost the whole space on each side, and the reserved gilt-edged bands of berried laurel, which have small corners at each junction to the putti panels, instead of a smooth curve. These differences in decoration seem to be consistent within that whole group of similarly decorated pieces.

It seems likely that the Comtesse du Barry commissioned the service during her early rise to power at Versailles, when she was establishing her influence and position at court as the new maîtresse-en-titre. Due to its small size, it must have been meant for small intimate and influential gatherings, either at Versailles or the Château de Louveciennes, which Louis XV had given her in 1769. At 60 livres a plate it was rather an expensive and opulent purchase, clearly meant as a status symbol demonstrating her importance at Versailles. It therefore does not surprise that at this early stage in her life as the King's favourite, she would have tried to further cement her position and ingratiate herself to the court by including an inscription to the marriage of the Dauphin on a cooler.

Moreau Jean Michel, le Jeune (1741-1814), Fête donnée à Louveciennes, 2 Septembre 1771, ©RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Michèle Bellot

Madame du Barry was born Jeanne Bécu on 19 April 1743, the illegitimate daughter of a seamstress in Lorraine. She was considered a great beauty and became a courtesan in the highest circles of Parisian society under the name of Mademoiselle Lange. During this time she befriended the Maréchal de Richelieu who would later become one of her staunch supporters at court. In 1768 Jeanne caught the eye of Louis XV who fell in love with her and arranged her marriage to Comte Guillaume du Barry, so that she would have a title and could eventually become his maîtresse-en-titre. During these early stages of her relationship with the King, she found herself up against some strong opposition at court and was ostracised from life at Versailles. Most pronounced was the antagonism of the duc de Choiseul, Minister of Foreign Affairs, who even went so far as to discuss a potential marriage of the recently widowed King with the Austrian Archduchess Elisabeth, eldest daughter of Empress Maria Theresa, with the Austrian ambassador, the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau. Madame du Barry was finally officially presented to the court at Versailles on 22 April 1769 and any plans for the King's remarriage were shelved, as Jeanne took her place as Louis' official mistress. With the help of the Maréchal de Richelieu and his nephew, the duc d'Aiguillon, who were bitter enemies of the duc de Choiseul, she started to cement her position at court.

Sèvres biscuit bust of Madame du Barry, circa 1772, modelled by Augustin Pajou, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Ann Payne Blumenthal, 1943.

In the spring of 1770 the duc de Choiseul, who was to fall from grace Christmas of the same year, saw his position strengthened for a short time, as the whole of France prepared to celebrate the royal wedding he had orchestrated: the marriage of the Dauphin to Maria Antonia of Austria, the youngest daughter of Empress Maria Theresa, later known as Marie-Antoinette. To the surprise of many, Louis XV defied convention and invited his still fairly new mistress to what was mainly a family gathering, the royal supper party at the Château de La Muette on 15 May 1770, the night before the wedding. It was the first time the favourite met the new Dauphine and before Marie-Antoinette's well-known antipathy towards the Comtesse du Barry manifested itself. The Dauphine would later not speak to, or even acknowledge the latter's presence, which eventually resulted in the King's complaints to the Comte de Mercy-Argenteau who in turn passed these on to Maria Theresa. After increasing pressure from her mother and the ambassador, she finally indirectly spoke to her on 1 January 1772 uttering the famous phrase: "There are a lot of people today at Versailles."

At the end of April 1774 the King contracted smallpox and Madame du Barry sat at his sickbed until he asked her to leave on 4 May, in the knowledge that he was dying. She left Versailles and retired to the duc d'Aiguillon's estates near Rueil. Louis XV died on 10 May and Madame du Barry was exiled to the Abbaye du Pont-aux-Dames. She was eventually allowed to leave in May 1775 and later able to return to the Château de Louveciennes, where she lived until her arrest during the French Revolution. She was executed on 8 December 1793.

Bonhams Head of European Ceramics, Nette Megens said, “Pieces from this very select service made for Madame du Barry hardly ever appear on the market. There were only three bottle coolers in the service, and this pair offers collectors with a once in a lifetime opportunity.”

Other highlights in the sale include: 

• A very large Berlin porcelain vase given to Sir Andrew Buchanan by the King of Prussia, circa 1859. Estimate £25,000-30,000. Distinguished 19th-century Scottish diplomat Sir Andrew Buchanan had an unusually wide-ranging career, and earned the gratitude not only of the British government, but also of the nations in which he served. The King of Prussia presented him with the magnificent Berlin vase; and the Danish king Frederick VII gave him a service of 18 plates by the Royal Copenhagen factory, with scenes after famous designs by Berthel Thorvaldsen. These are also in the sale, estimated at £10,000-15,000.

Lot 117. A very large Berlin porcelain vase given to Sir Andrew Buchanan by the King of Prussia, circa 1859; 90cm high. Estimate £ 25,000 - 30,000 (€ 29,000 - 35,000). Photo: Bonhams.

'Schinkelsche Sorte', the flared neck finely painted with a continuous scene after Adolf Schrödter depicting 'Triumph des Königs Wein' (Triumph of the Wine King) between burgundy-ground borders decorated with bands of gilt entwined scrollwork and foliage, the burnished gilt rim tooled with a band of false gadroons, the lower body mounted with two gilt-metal bacchic masks and surmounted by a beaded collar supporting the neck, painted after designs by Hermann Looschen with heart-shaped panels reserved on a pale-lavender ground painted with fruiting vines and iron-red scrollwork over a gilt stiff-leaf border, the foot surmounted by a metal collar above the gilt-edged flared top over a band of moulded gilt fruiting vines, the high flared foot with lavender ground, reserved with gilt scrollwork and foliate swags with pendant gilt husks tied with ribbons, the footrim with entwined gilt bands inside the burnished gilt-ground rim tooled with a formal foliate border, sceptre and pfennig marks in underglaze-blue, the footrim inscribed 'E.F.' in blue, the bottom rim of the neck inscribed 'No: 3' in red.

Provenance:  Purchased on 15 December 1859 by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia;
Given by King Wilhelm I of Prussia to Sir Andrew Buchanan, 1st Bart. (1807-1882), Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the King of Prussia, in 1864;
Thence by descent to the present owner.

Exhibited: London, The International Exhibition, 1 May-1 November 1862.

The International Exhibition, 1862.

Note: In the mid 19th century, the Berlin porcelain manufactory's most important client - as in the time of Frederick the Great - was the king of Prussia, who took porcelain for state gifts etc. to a value of around 16,000 Thaler every year. This vase was purchased by King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia (1795-1861) and is recorded in the account books of his private purchases: "15. Dezember 1859: Mit König Wein aus Coul: rund herum nach Schrötter die Lippe oben auf [Gold] u grav: Uber u unter dem Bilde brauner Reif mit [Gold] braun staff: Kante. Bauch u Fuß [Gold] u Coul: Dec: nach Looschen 1 gl Vase Schinkelsche Sr:" [15 December 1859: with Wine King in col: all around after Schrötter the rim above in [Gold] and engraved: above and below the picture a brown loop with (gold) brown decoration; border, belly and foot [gold] and col: Dec: after Looschen 1 [?] vase Schinkel sort] (Stiftung Preussische Schloesser und Gaerten Berlin-Brandenburg, KPM-Archiv (Land Berlin), Akte Nr. 354, Rex 1818-1863, p. 154).

It seems likely that the vase was originally purchased without a specific recipient in mind, or was perhaps not given due to the king's incapacity (his brother Wilhelm acted as regent after 1858 and succeeded him as king in 1861). In any event, the vase was exhibited in London at the 1862 International Exhibition and is clearly visible, along with another large Krater vase, in photographs depicting the Berlin porcelain manufactory's display (Fig. 1). The vases were also noted in the official record of the 1862 Exhibition: "The royal manufactory at Berlin will take the second place among the porcelain works of the Continent [...] Many of the works are very fine - some of the paintings on large vases, plaques, &c., particularly so [...] A pair of large crater-shaped vases are good examples of the German school of porcelain painting. The designs are happy, and the treatment altogether very good" (Record of the International Exhibition 1862, William Mackenzie: Glasgow, Edinburgh and London, 1862, p. 423).

It seems likely that the vase was originally purchased without a specific recipient in mind, or was perhaps not given due to the king's incapacity (his brother Wilhelm acted as regent after 1858 and succeeded him as king in 1861). In any event, the vase was exhibited in London at the 1862 International Exhibition and is clearly visible, along with another large Krater vase, in photographs depicting the Berlin porcelain manufactory's display (Fig. 1). The vases were also noted in the official record of the 1862 Exhibition: "The royal manufactory at Berlin will take the second place among the porcelain works of the Continent [...] Many of the works are very fine - some of the paintings on large vases, plaques, &c., particularly so [...] A pair of large crater-shaped vases are good examples of the German school of porcelain painting. The designs are happy, and the treatment altogether very good" (Record of the International Exhibition 1862, William Mackenzie: Glasgow, Edinburgh and London, 1862, p. 423).

Sir Andrew Buchanan, circa 1860.

Sir Andrew Buchanan, 1st Baronet (1807-1882), had an extraordinarily long and varied career in the diplomatic service beginning in 1825, when he was attached to the embassy at Constantinople. He subsequently served in Rio de Janeiro, two more times in Constantinople, Washington, St. Petersburg, Florence, the Swiss Confederation, and, in 1853, he was appointed envoy extraordinary to the King of Denmark. He became ambassador extraordinary to the King of Prussia in October 1862, for which he was appointed Privy Councillor. In September 1864, he was appointed ambassador extraordinary to Russia, and was ambassador to Austria from October 1871 until his retirement in February 1878. He was created a baronet in 1878. It is a measure of the importance of the relationship with Great Britain, as well perhaps as the personal esteem in which Sir Andrew Buchanan was held, that King Wilhelm I of Prussia chose such a large and costly vase as a gift. According the Director of the manufactory between 1850-67, Georg Kolbe, large vases such as the present lot were typically given to the most important recipients, including the emperors of Russia and Austria, the kings of Bavaria, Belgium, Portugal and the Netherlands, as well as numerous other princes (quoted by E. Köllmann/M. Jarchow, Berliner Porzellan (1987), Textband, p. 91). Sir Andrew also received an additional, more intimate gift from the Wilhelm I of a portrait plaque depicting the king together with his consort, Augusta of Saxony-Weimar-Eisenach, their son, Crown Prince Friedrich, and his consort, Victoria, Princess Royal, and their son, Prince Wilhelm (later Emperor Wilhelm II) (lot 120 in this sale).

The design by Karl Friedrich Schinkel (based on the renowned Medici-Krater in the Uffizi collections in Florence) of 1830 for a vase of this form was in the Schinkel-Museum Berlin until 1945 (reproduced by Vasilissa Pachmova-Göres, Schinkels Wirken für die Königliche Porzellanmanufaktur Berlin, in Forschungen und Berichte, vol. 25 (1985), pl. 47, ill. 14). The vase based on this design was given by King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia to the Russian Emperor Nicholas I in 1834 (now in the Hermitage, St, Petersburg, illustrated by Pachmova-Göres, pl. 47, ill. 13). This vase model was known in the Berlin porcelain manufactory as 'Schinkelsche Sorte' (Schinkel Type) and was produced with various types of decoration and mounts, probably until the 1860s (Pachmova-Göres, p. 155).

Adolf Schrödter (1805-1875) was a painter, illustrator, political satirist and author, who excelled at frieze-like compositions. He entered the Berlin Academy in 1820 and was a student of Wilhelm Schadow at the Düsseldorf Academy from 1829. He was active in Frankfurt a.M. from 1848 to 1854, when he returned to Düsseldorf. He was appointed Professor für Ornamentik at the Technische Hochschule in Karlsruhe in 1859. The series of nine paintings of around 1852 depicting 'The Triumph of the Wine King' illustrating the poem of the same name by C. de Marées are now in the Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe (inv. nos. 1409/1-8 and 2291). Schrödter apparently did several versions of the same subject, including a series of watercolours (formerly in the National-Galerie, Berlin, missing since 1945), that may have served as models for the Berlin porcelain painter. The watercolours were published in 1870 by Bruckmann in Munich (J. Lauts/W. Zimmermann, Katalog neuere Meister 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (1971), p. 232).

Hermann Looschen (1807-1873) was active at the Berlin porcelain manufactory from 1832 and was appointed Senior Painter (Obermaler) and, in 1848, succeeded G.W. Völker in charge of decoration. He exhibited at the Berlin Academy between 1839 and 1850, mostly depictions of flowers and fruit.

The significance of the letters 'E.F.' on the footrim of the vase, which are also recorded on other large vases of the 1840s and 1850s, remains a mystery, though they are more likely to be technical specifications to do with the bronze mounts than a signature (S. Wittwer, Raffinesse & Eleganz (2007), p. 435).

• A rare Meissen silver-gilt mounted tankard with Chinoiserie decoration, circa 1723-24. Estimate £20,000-30,000. This piece is from private European collection and shows the very best of chinoiserie painting and gilding on early Meissen porcelain.

Lot 42. A Meissen silver-gilt-mounted tankard, circa 1723-24; 20cm high overall. Estimate £ 20,000 - 30,000 (€ 23,000 - 35,000). Photo: Bonhams.

Finely painted with a chinoiserie scene depicting five figures flanking a fruiting tree with a flower bowl and another vessel on high pedestals, within a gilt quatrelobe scrollwork cartouche filled with Böttger lustre and embellished with iron-red scrollwork, flanked by birds in flight and two perched on branches, the handle painted with trailing indianische Blumen, gilt foliate scrollwork borders to both rims, the silver cover inscribed 'Peter Ehlers aus der Wilster-Marsch, Anno 1746 den 17ten May', the top of the cover inscribed 'Renovirt/ d. 17t. May 1846/ von/ Matthias Ehlers', the rim with a band of foliate scrollwork, ball thumbpiece, the base mounted with a silver-gilt collar with stiff-leaf border, (haircrack below handle at rear).

Provenance: Private European Collection.

• A Nymphenburg Commedia dell'Arte figure of Mezzetin dressed as a Harlequin, circa 1760-65. Estimate: £30,000-50,000. This figure is traditionally paired with another Commedia dell’Arte figure, Lalage, who holds a bowl and a spoon, ready to feed the 'infant' in Mezzetin's arms (actually a monkey dressed as a baby).

Lot 105. A Nymphenburg Commedia dell'Arte figure of Mezzetin dressed as a Harlequin, circa 1760-65; 19.5cm high. Estimate: £30,000-50,000  (€ 35,000 - 58,000). Photo: Bonhams.

Modelled by Franz Anton Bustelli, holding a monkey wrapped up like a baby, wearing a hat with iron-red zig-zag pattern, a black mask and a Harlequin suit in shades of black, red and yellow, on a gilt-edged scroll-moulded base, impressed shield mark to reverse of base (some chips).

Provenance: UK Private Collection, by the 1930s;
Thence by descent.

Note: For a discussion of the eight pairs of figures from the Italian Comedy modelled by Franz Anton Bustelli in 1759-70, see K. Hantschmann, Italienische Komödie, in K. Hantschmann/A. Ziffer, Franz Anton Bustelli (2005), 254-263. This figure of Mezzetin dressed as Harlequin is paired with Lalage, who holds a bowl and a spoon, ready to feed the 'infant' in Mezzetin's arms. See Hantschmann/Ziffer, no. 151, for the example of this figure in the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, along with other examples recorded in the literature and now mostly in museum collections.

Marco Marcola, An Italian Comedy in Verona, 1772, The Art Institute of Chicago, Gift of Emily Crane Chadbourne