Pie Dish with Cover

Wedgwood

About 1800

  • Titles Pie Dish with Cover (Descriptive)
  • Artist Wedgwood, England, est. 1759
  • Medium caneware
  • Dimensions 2 x 8 1/2 x 5 3/8 in. (5.1 x 21.6 x 13.7 cm)
  • Credit Line Collection of the Art Fund, Inc. at the Birmingham Museum of Art; The Buten Wedgwood Collection, gift through the Wedgwood Society of New York, AFI.3321.2008a-b
  • Work Type dish with cover
  • Classification Containers

See More of the Collection

Oval black medallion with profile portrait of Tiberius facing right
Oval blue jasper medallion with white relief profile portrait of Alexander the great (356-323 BC). Alexander was a Greek soldier, son of Philip of Macedon, born in Pella, and educated by Aristotle. At an early age he showed military talent of a high order, crossing the Hellespont in 334 to defeat a Persian army led by Darius. He consolidated this victory by occupying Palestine, marching thence to Egypt where he was hailed as a deliverer from Persian tyranny. He founded Alexandria in 331 B.C., and again defeated Darius in the same year. By 329 he had reached the river of Jaxartes, and in 328 subdued the whole of Sogdiana. In 326 he attempted the conquest of India, establishing Greek colonies in the Punjab, and bringing Greek influence to the art in the East, Returning to Babylon he began to plan for further conquests, but was taken ill after a banquet and died eleven days later. His body deposited in Alexandria in a soldiers coffin.
Round covered box of solid royal blue jasper with white relief decoration, around the sides of the body are small floral motifs and on the cover is the portrait bust of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh in civil dress beneath a crown with two laurel branches with berries and a banner below that reads, "HRH DUKE OF EDINBURGH."
Large, heavy tablet of black basalt press-molded with the image in high relief of a Bacchanalian sacrifice - the frenzied scene of cherubs, satyrs, goats, and men playing horns with grape vines, twigs of grape leaves and bunches of grapes in a landscape with a tree to the left.