Collection Online
St Peter, Martyr, bowl
Medium
earthenware (maiolica)
Measurements
4.5 × 24.8 cm diameter
Place/s of Execution
(Urbino), Italy
Accession Number
4674-D3
Department
International Decorative Arts
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Felton Bequest, 1940
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of Digitisation Champion Ms Carol Grigor through Metal Manufactures Limited
Gallery location
14th - 16th Century Gallery - Painting & Decorative Arts
Level 1, NGV International
About this work

The painted decoration of this bowl includes a depiction of St Peter of Verona, patron of inquisitors and midwives, a celebrated early Dominican preacher in northern and central Italy who was martyred by heretics in the mid thirteenth century. His attribute is the knife blade which split his skull and killed him. Peter’s tomb in Milan became a pilgrimage shrine, and maiolica objects such as this one, bearing images of saints, sometimes functioned as pilgrimage souvenirs. Such objects may also have served to introduce images of exemplary figures into the home, providing models of appropriate moral and religious conduct.

Physical description
On foot, (Pringsheim 98)-Decorated with an image of St Peter, Martyr.