Service of 12 dinner plates decorated with birds Royal Vienna manufactory porcelain, late 19th c.

Each plate is decorated at its center with a hand-painted bird rendered with great naturalistic precision against a landscape background in fresh, luminous tones. The rim is entirely fire-gilded with a leafy garland motif. The gilded, scalloped edge is characteristic of Viennese production of the era. 

The subjects, executed in the tradition of illustrated scientific ornithology, recall the plates found in the great natural history publications of the period.