Items from the Egyptian Service

Early 19th century

Painted after designs by Dominique Vivant Denon

Sèvres Porcelain Manufactory

France

The Egyptian Service, numbering 146 items, was given to Alexander I by Napoleon during their meeting at Erfurt in 1808. "Egyptomania" in the decorative and applied arts was evoked by Napoleon's 1798-99 campaign in Egypt. The subjects depicted on the items in the service were produced from the drawings of Vivant Denon, the future Emperor's advisor on questions of art who accompanied him on the Egyptian campaign. Those drawings were published in a book -Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt - that came out in Paris and London in 1802. On the bottom of each piece an inscription indicates the subject. Only ten items from this enormous service, produced at the Sèvres manufactory, are now in the Hermitage. The greater part of them are kept in the Ceramics Museum at Kuskovo in Moscow.