Staffordshire Figurine The Prudent Mother and Child Reading - After the Enoch Wood Original - This version antique Victorian circa 1850 20.3 cm high

English Staffordshire pottery figurine of a woman in a long floral dress sat on a large high backed carved wooden arm chair with a young girl child, also in long flowing robes, reading a book that is resting upon the woman's knee. It dates to the mid 19th century circa 1850 to 1860.

The large size of the book leads us to think that it may be the bible and it may possibly be based upon St. Anne and the Virgin Mary. There is an earlier Enoch Wood version of this figure titled St Anne and this figure is very similar in design. It could also possibly based upon the medieval carved wooden altar figures such as the the ones in the Victoria and Albert museum collection number A.79-1925 and CIRC.77-1925 and 411-1905

However The Derby Porcelain works also made a similar designed figure that they called "The Prudent Mother". The woman's dress and the style of the chair is of the late eighteenth to early nineteenth century so it probably is the Prudent Mother.  There is an example of the Derby figurine in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge see their collections object reference C.3077 -1928.

The figure offered here is a Staffordshire earthenware pottery decorated poly-chrome enamel multi-coloured version with a small amount of gilt embellishment. This is a flatback figurine but it is also decorated to the back as well as to the front. The figurine is nicely moulded with shell and scroll details to the back of the chair,  it is hand coloured with yellow, green, pink, blue, black and brown enamels.

The figurine is in very good antique condition with a firing tear to the body of the child and left hand on the book. There is a small chip and short associated crack to the foot rim at the back some glaze crazing and very minor wear or losses to the enamel, no restoration. - see images.

This is a great item for display and highly decorative and attractive example of religious or biblical or maternal figural Victorian Staffordshire pottery.

Height 8 inches ( 20,3 cm)
Depth 3 7/8 inches (9.8 cm)
Width 5 1/8 inches (13 cm)
Weight 643 grammes unpacked