porcelain, burnished gilt body with matt gilt edging, leaf border with rosettes, frieze of acanthus, rosettes and cones, the well with the crowned coat-of-arms, Ø 24,5 cm, 1 plate with restored crack, burnished gilt ground with scuffing, the underside each with 2 gilt edges
Manufactur de Dihl et Guérhard á Paris, red stamp-mark ca. 1811 (Ru)

Josephine de Beauharnais (Martinique 1763-1814 Rueil-Malmaison), married in 1779 to the French officer Alexandre, Vicomte de Beauharnais, children Eugéne and Hortense, divorced in 1785. In 1796, she married General Napoleon Bonaparte, crowned Empress in Paris in 1804, divorced in 1809, retreat to Chateau Malmaison, which she purchased in 1799. In 1811, she was given the above service. Josephine dies at Malmaison in 1814. In 1806 her son Eugène married a Bavarian princess … related via her son's daughter, the Duke of Leuchtenberg, Josephine von Leuchtenberg, wife to King Oscar I. of Sweden, she is one of the ancestors of the ruling dynasties of Belgium, Denmark, Luxemburg, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Sweden. In 1839 Maximilian Joseph Eugéne Auguste Napoleon de Beauharnais and 3rd Duke of Leuchtenberg marries the Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, daughter of Tsar Nikolaus I of Russia and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. In 1839, the services by Dihl and Guérhard are brought to St Petersburg together with other art of Maximillian’s grandmother at Malmaison.
Exhibition 2007 “France in Russia”: The “Empress Joséphine’s Malmaison Collection” at the Heremitage Rooms im Somerset House in London, celebrated on of France's most renowned women, Napoleon Bonaparte's wife Joséphine de Beauharnais. This exhibition focuses on Joséphine’s role as an insatiable collector and patron and brings together some of the most beautiful pictures, sculpture, and decorative art which she originally acquired for her cháteau at Malmaison. Today housed at the Hermitage in St Petersburg, the exhibition also recounts the story of how part of her collection travelled to Russia as a consequence of Napoleon's defeat.
The Dihl et Guérhard Manufactory was one of 9 Paris painting studios, which in a decree dated 16.5.1784 were permitted to practise porcelain painting. Previously it was only permissible to use a single colour, while gilding was not allowed.