✦ Italy, Urbino · 1532
A family device in a crowded sky
A painted plate places Pucci arms inside a figurative scene, joining domestic display with a difficult history of representation.
Bequest of John L. Severance · CC0. Resized without cropping or recolouring.
Enlarge the photograph ↗✦ Photograph-based observations
What belongs to the arms, and what belongs to the story?
A small shield with a dark profile head sits near the centre of a richly painted plate. A winged child holds it amid larger figures, clouds, a column, and a yellow rim.
The field inside the shield is only one part of the decoration. Figures surrounding it are larger than the charge, but visual prominence does not make them heraldic supporters.
What the record tells us
Cleveland identifies the family as Pucci and records Francesco Xanto Avelli as the maker. It dates the Urbino maiolica to 1532. Its discussion places armorial tableware within elite commissions; it does not establish a named recipient or the original circumstances of this particular plate’s use. [1]
✦ Editorial interpretation
What follows from the arrangement?
The small shield occupies only part of a much larger figurative scene. If we describe every surrounding figure as part of the arms, we lose the distinction the painting itself makes between the device and its setting. Begin with the shield's boundary and the head represented inside it. Then investigate how historical and modern records describe that representation. The catalogue's family identification helps locate the device, but it does not settle the racial meanings of the image or make inherited terminology an adequate explanation of them.
Family identification does not identify a particular sitter, patron, or contemporary descendant. The device also raises questions about how race and human difference were represented in elite European visual culture. Those questions need evidence from the period and the object’s commission. Neither a modern surname search nor a decorative description can answer them.
Claims and their evidence
| Claim | Evidence | Limit |
|---|---|---|
| A small shield with a dark profile head sits near the centre of a richly painted plate. A winged child holds it amid larger figures, clouds, a column, and a yellow rim. | Object photograph | Photographed arrangement; not a new dating or bearer identification. |
| 1532; Italy, Urbino. | Museum object record [1] | Catalogue date and attribution, with their stated qualifications. |
| The museum identifies Pucci arms and dates the plate to 1532. | Museum object record [1] | No named original owner or recipient is established in this study. |
✦ Your turn
Explain what supports your conclusion.
Draw the border of the shield and list its internal features separately from the surrounding scene. Then write a short account of the family identification that distinguishes the museum’s attribution from a claim about a specific patron.
Discuss your answer
A strong answer treats the human head as a charge without turning the larger narrative figures into parts of a blazon. It attributes the family and maker to the museum, preserves the unknown commission, and recognizes that responsible interpretation may require historical research into the representation itself.
Take the research further
Compare the companion Pucci plate in Cleveland and look for inscriptions, dates, or published discussions of the service. Ask which evidence ties individual plates to one commission and which merely demonstrates the repeated use of a family’s device.
Return to the related Academy reading ↗Sources and image rights
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Plate with Arms of the Pucci Family, accession1942.625. Record consulted 2026-10-10. The date above describes the artifact or photograph, not the publication date of this webpage.
- CC0 — image rights. The individual collection record permits this image’s reuse under CC0. Catalogue prose is summarized in our own words. Image credit: Bequest of John L. Severance.
Show the BibTeX citation
@misc{jhheraldry_object-pucci-maiolica,
author = {{Cleveland Museum of Art}},
title = {Plate with Arms of the Pucci Family (accession 1942.625)},
howpublished = {\url{https://clevelandart.org/art/1942.625}},
url = {https://clevelandart.org/art/1942.625},
note = {Original-language museum collection record. Accessed 2026-10-10.}
}