Hans Rudolf Meyer, Basle, ca. 1680
Silver, embossed, chased, engraved
diameters 34 x40.5 cm
Inv.1941.478.
During the Renaissance and Baroque periods, apart from sacred and mythological subjects, the main themes of artistic representation were subjects taken from the immediate experience of man and his surroundings. The embossed scene of an ill-fated bear hunt in a clearing in an oak wood is of this kind. Itself savaged by a hound, a bear has attacked one of the two spear-bearing hunters. Lying on his back on the ground, his arms helplessly outstretched, he hopes for rescue by his companion. This dramatic scene in the depressed center of the oval salver is in stark contrast to the motif on the wide rim, where an idyllic sequence of curling foliage with eight stylised blossoms forms a garland in high relief. The Basle goldsmith Hans Rudolf Meyer made the platter for an important merchant from Brig, Kaspar Jodok Stockalper (1609-1691), who had the marks of his ownership punched into the center.
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