1710-1713

The form was designed by the Dresden Court Silversmith Johann Jacob Irminger (1635?-1724) who was asked by the King in 1710 (and subsequently formally instructed in 1712) to contribute designs for Böttger’s new stoneware. He created this model of coffee-pot by fusing contemporary Baroque silver models with decoration derived from Chinese originals (the sea-monster’s head is derived from fish’s heads found on Chinese pieces). It has also been suggested that the form of Japanese sake-bottles may have influenced Irminger’s design, as well as being similar to coffee-pots made by Huguenot goldsmiths in England.¹The sides would originally have been moulded with prunus branches, but these have been removed by polishing (traces of these branches can still just be seen).  For a stoneware coffee-pot with a polished spout but unpolished sides, see Ulrich Pietsch, Early Meissen Porcelain, The Wark Collection from The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens, London, 2011, p. 65, no. 6.

1. By Ulrike Weinhold, curator of the Grünes Gewölbe, Dresden, cited by Maria Santangelo, A Princely Pursuit, The Malcolm D. Gutter Collection of Early Meissen Porcelain, San Francisco, 2018, p. 41 and note 27.