Foot-washing ceremony
Sèvres and Meissen Services

Various services

This white and gold dinner service was acquired in 1851 for Emperor Ferdinand, nicknamed ‘the Good-Natured’ by the people, who abdicated from the throne in favour of his young nephew, Franz Joseph, and subsequently moved to the castle at Prague.

The dinner service

The white and gold dinner service was ordered for his new household in Prague from the porcelain manufactory of the Counts of Thun at Klösterle in Bohemia.

The Dinner Service for Archduke Ferdinand Max, later Emperor Maximilian of Mexico, came to Vienna from Miramare, the archduke’s palatial villa near Trieste. The dinner service is a product of the Herend porcelain manufactory in Hungary, which

shortly after being taken over by Moritz Fischer in 1839 specialized in making copies of Chinese models. Initial contacts with the imperial court in Vienna in 1854 were successful: Franz Joseph purchased a tea service as a Christmas gift for his mother Archduchess Sophie. In 1864 a new service for Archduke Ferdinand Max was commissioned.

Further Reading