both decorated en grisaille with flesh tints, depicting scenes from the story of Jason and the Argonauts, one with Medea invoking the gods, the arrival of her serpent-drawn chariot, and her departure in the background, the border with interlinked scrolls and chariots interspersed with frolicking putti and satyrs and the number 18, the reverse bearing the arms of the Mesmes family impaled with the arms of the Dolu family flanked by allegorical or mythological scenes, the other with Medea’s escape from the island of Corinth after she has set the king’s palace on fire, with a similar border and number 26, the reverse with the same coat of arms and dated 1568.

RELATED LITERATURE
J.-J. Marquet de Vasselot, “La Conquête de la toison d’or et les émailleurs Limousins du XVIe siècle.” Revue de l’Art Ancien et Moderne 34, 1913, nos.333-345.
Emmanuelle Brugerolles and David Guillet, eds. The Renaissance in France: Drawings from the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, Transl. Judith Schub. Seattle, University of Washington Press, 1995.
Sophie Baratte, Les Emaux peints de Limoges, Paris, Réunion des musées nationaux, 2000.

These plates form part of a series of twenty six, of which one has disappeared; the other plates are divided among different collections, including the Louvre, British Museum, and private collections.  They were probably made for Jean-Jacques Mesmes, president of the grand Conseil, and his wife, Geneviève Do🥂lu, daughter of the secretary to the king.  The family later acquired the titles of Comte d’Avaux and Marquis de Roissi𝔉.

The designs for the plates were taken from prints by René Boyvin after drawings by Léonard Thiry for the 1563 publication of the Livre de la Conqueste de la Toison d’Or. Numbers 1, 3, 6 and 13 are in the collection of the Louvre; 3 is signed “P R,” and 13 is signed and dated 1567.  Number 24, now in the British Museum, is dated 1568.