A PAIR OF EMPIRE PATINATED BRONZE, ORMOLU, GIALLO ANTICO AND AFRICANO MARBLE TAZZE

Inspired by 'Antique' bronze tripods discovered in archaeological expeditions of the mid-18th Century, these athéniennes became particularly fashionable in the last decades of the 18th Century. One of the most celebrated examples of this form is the vase mounted by Pierre Gouthière (1732-1813) for the duc d'Aumont and now in the Wallace Collection, which is illustrated in J. Robiquet, Gouthière. Sa vie. Son oeuvre, Paris, 1912, pl. XII. Its three curved uprights headed by masks and framing a central shaft with entwined snake illustrate a design which was successfully used for guéridons, athéniennes and of course tazze.
A pair of related tazze is in the Louvre, illustrated in H. Ottomeyer P. Pröschel, et al., Vergoldete Bronzen, vol. I, Munich, 1986, p. 267.