A Doccia gilt-metal mounted snuff box, circa 1760

The cover and sides moulded in relief in imitation of classical cameos with portrait busts and scrollwork and shells heightened in puce and iron-red, the underside with a spray of flowers, the inside cover painted with a scene depicting a woman flanked by two gentlemen reading a book of music, 7.3cm long, 6cm wide, 3.7cm high (small restored section to one side of cover)

Provenance:
With Gianetti Antonia Antiquitá, Milano (paper label to interior)
Italian private collection since the 1960s;
Thence by descent

The idea of producing boxes with relief portraits in imitation of classical cameos was conceived by Padre Scolopio Don Alberto Papiani, the philosophy teacher to the sons of the owner of the Doccia manufactory, the Marchese Ginori. The intention was that the snuff boxes would give their owners some instruction in history, as well as being objects of beauty. The moulded decoration of the 'tabbachiere dei Cammei' or snuff boxes with cameo-moulding, would have changed from box to box, but there are three main groups, those with Roman Emperors, Alexander the Great and the subsequent Emperors of Egypt, and the great thinkers and poets of antiquity.

The most prolific painter of these boxes was the famous Giusepe Romei, who is first found in the factory records in 1742. Between 1743-49 he was paid for painting at least 37 snuff boxes, and possibly more, many of them with non-specified cameo-moulding (see A. Biancalana, Porcellane E Maioliche A Doccia: La Fabbrica Dei Marchesi Ginori I Primi Cento Anni (2009), p.134f.). The 'Cammei' were also used for the decoration of Bassorelievi or low-relief moulded plaques. A plaque with highly comparable titled portrait plaques is illustrated by Biancalana, op.cit., p.112.

Another Doccia cameo box from the Collezione Procida Mirabelli di Lauro was sold in these rooms, 6 July 2010, lot 39, and another from the Helmut Joseph Collection, sold in these rooms, 5 July 2011, lot 56.