The center painted with a donkey recumbent on a bed of straw, surrounded by insects and ribbon-tied branches of Holzschnittblumen, including lily, poppy, tulip, and asters, the rim with a daffodil, a viola and forget me-nots, within shaped gilt rim
9¹⁄₄ in. (23.5cm.) diameter

Gift of Elector Freidrich-August of Saxony to Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, British Envoy to Dresden (1747-1755).
The Dr. Edward G. Shiffmann Collection; Sotheby's, New York, 20 October 1994, lot 315.
Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 15 April, 1997, lot 112.

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Lot Essay

The present plate is from a service given by King Augustus III to the British Envoy to the Saxon Court, Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, in 1748. For an extensive discussion, including print sources for the flowers and insects, see T.H. Clarke, 'Das Northumberland-Service aus Meissener Porzellan', Keramos, 1975, no. 70, pp. 9-182. This plate is one of only a handful of pieces from this service known to be outside of Alnick Castle, Northumberland.