of typical form, on square base, the sides cast with bacchic masks and thyrsus, all on a lion pelt-cast ground, with two reeded bifurcated branch handles, with egg and dart and beaded borders above a band of applied fruiting vines
21cm high, 30cm wide over handles, 63oz, 1,959gr

The Warwick Vase, now in the Burrell Collection, Glasgow was discovered at Hadrian's Villa in the late 18^th century by Gavin Hamilton, a Scottish art dealer in Rome. The vase was found on the villa's extensive grounds, which Hamilton had been given permission to excavate. It was in pieces when discovered and sold by Hamilton to Sir William Hamilton, British envoy at the court of Naples, and passed from him to his nephew George Greville, 2nd Earl of Warwick. The celebrated engraver Giovanni Battista Piranesi made two etchings of the vase once its restoration was complete and published these engraving in his 1778 publication Vasi, candelabri, cippi, sarcofagi, tripodi, lucerne, ed ornamenti antichi disegnati ed incisi dal Cav. Gio. Batt. Piranesi, (Vases, candelabra, grave stones, sarcophagi, tripods, lamps, and ornaments designed and etched by Cavalieri Giovanni Battista Piranesi) which will no doubt have added to the fame of the vase.

The Earl of Warwick had intended to sell the vase to the British Museum but the sale wasn’t to come to pass so he kept it at Warwick Castle where it remained until 1978 when it was sold to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York but before it could leave the country it was declared to be of national importance and so an export license was denied and the funds were instead raised for it to stay in the country. In the decades since it was discovered it was to prove a popular form for silversmiths to copy with many examples known from the beginning of the 19^th century and through into the 20^th century.