Literature

This plate was produced in 1773 as part of a service intended for Louis XV’s last mistress the Comtesse du Barry. The pattern is the same as the one for the service given in December 1773 by Louis XV to Maria Carolina, Queen of Naples, one of Marie-Antoinette’s elder sisters. For that service, the central initials are CL, reflecting either two of Maria Carolina’s names (Carolina Luisa), or the conjoined initials of her and her infant daughter Luisa, since the service was presented on the occasion of young Luisa’s baptism, for which Louis XV stood godfather.

Louis XV died on 10th May 1774, before Madame du Barry’s new dinner service had been completed. She was immediately sent into exile so the new service was never completed and delivered to her.

Only a very few pieces had actually been fully decorated before Louis XV’s death, including this plate and a small number of others; one in the collection of the Duke of Buccleuch at Boughton House and another in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Another was sold by Adrian Sassoon to an English private collection in 2024 and another was formerly in the Pompey collection, sold Christie’s New York, 23 May 2002, lot 47. The latter two plates as well as the Victoria & Albert Museum's and the present example each have the same date, painter and gilder's marks.