Sevres snuffbox with French princess' royal pets bought for Versailles

"A gold and porcelain snuffbox made by Sevres for Madame Adelaide, the daughter of King Louis XV, will return to the Palace of Versailles for the first time since the French Revolution. Beautifully painted on the outside of the lid, inside of the lid and on the bottom with portraits of royal dogs and cats, it is one of only four Sevres snuffboxes depicting the pets of the French royal family known to have been made."

"The Royal Sevres Porcelain Manufactory made the oval porcelain snuffbox with a bleu-lapis ground in its hallmark deep blue shade and a chased and engraved gold mount by royal goldsmiths Charles Ouizille and Pierre-Francois Drais in 1785. Madame Adelaide (1732-1800), the formidable daughter of Louis XV and Queen Marie Leszczynska, commissioned the paintings of her four dogs and one cat, starring her white barbet Vizir with his distinctive lion cut on the lid."

"The lid depicts Vizir and a pug playing in a garden; on the bottom a greyhound and spaniel frolic in a wooded landscape. The interior cover features a fluffy black and white cat wearing a pink ribbon on a cushion with a garland of flowers, a pair of lanterns on a stick and a dog collar inscribed Adelaid. The cat is pawing at a ring toy that looks like something you could get from a pet store today."

An oval gold-and-porcelain snuffbox made by the Royal Sevres Porcelain Manufactory in 1785 will return to the Palace of Versailles for the first time since the French Revolution. The box has a bleu-lapis ground and a chased, engraved gold mount by royal goldsmiths Charles Ouizille and Pierre-Francois Drais. Nicolas-Pierre Pithou the Younger painted miniature portraits of Madame Adelaide's four dogs and one cat, with the white barbet Vizir prominently on the lid. The lid shows Vizir and a pug in a garden; the bottom shows a greyhound and spaniel in a wooded landscape. The interior cover depicts a black-and-white cat with a pink ribbon and a collar inscribed Adelaid. Sevres sales records document delivery on January 19, 1786, and the princess used the box for three years before the Fall of the Bastille in 1789.

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