Pair of Lidded Chestnut Bowls (marronnières à ozier)

Roasted and peeled chestnuts were a particular delicacy in the 1700s, served as a dessert with a coating of icing in bowls such as this pair. Factories generally sold the bowls singly, though they also came in pairs as part of a dinner or dessert service. The Sèvres porcelain manufactory's stock books list several different designs for chestnut bowls. For bowls with pierced decoration, such as this pair, customers would have to pay nearly twice as much as for less intricate examples. It took all the skills of the kiln manager to prevent the sides from separating or sagging each time the piece was fired. He would have fired this pair three times, once for the porcelain body and the ground color, once for the enameled colors, and once for the gilding.