Dated 1605 and 1654 AD. A group of two ceramic fireguards, each with bell-shaped socket and strap handle; one with white applied decoration including the sun with mask and two flowers with a date of 1605; the other a fragment with reconstituted elements, orange in colour with yellow slashes, star, rosette and partial date '[..]54' for 1654. 443 grams total, 15-17cm (6 - 6 3/4"). Property of a Suffolk collector; acquired in the 1990s. 1605 was the year of the 'Gunpowder Plot', a plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament which was foiled when, following an anonymous tip-off, Sir Thomas Knyvet, a justice of the peace, found Catholic plotter Guy Fawkes in a cellar below the Parliament building and ordered a search of the area, finding thirty six barrels of gunpowder. Fawkes was arrested for trying to kill King James I and the members who were scheduled to sit together in Parliament the next day. Fawkes spoke the legendary words: 'Remember, remember, the Fifth of November'. In 1654 Oliver Cromwell created a union between England and Scotland, with Scottish representation in the Parliament of England. [2]