Minton majolica birds and game pie dish and cover

This pie dish by Minton is unusually formed to appear as a basket surmounted by a bed of dead game. The body of the dish emulates the weave of a basket, with oak stems and leaves intertwined through the latticework. Oak leaf bundles form the handles on the sides of the dish’s body. The body, which stands on four branch-form feet, is topped by a lid imitative of a bed of oak and fern leaves upon which lie a dead hare, mallard, and blackbird. The handle of the lid is formed from a mock oak branch. The pie dish is beautifully finished with majolica glazes, the rich colours of which persist.

The dish is impressed underneath with ‘668’ and ‘MINTON’, among other illegible marks.