Sisters, Sisters. . .

There were never such devoted sisters. . . .

Sisters, Irving Berlin, 1954

These sea siren sisters were so devoted to each other, that after a century of separation, they finally found each other at last. The lovely lorelei with the red flowers adorning her hair has been in my collection for many years, but I recently found her long-lost sister with blue blossoms. Reunited, these mermaids are of excellent precolored bisque and each is about 4.25 inches long. They are of the split tail variety, with legs that end in finny feet long, faint molded scales reaching from their ankles to mid-thigh. The recently-arrived sister is incised across her lower back "Sp. 1275" and on left edge of her back "Germany." The other has similar markings, but is instead incised "Sp. 1274."

On January 7, 2001, Theriaults auctioned off samples from the Hertwig and Company archives. Subsequently, Theriaults published a book entitled The Ladies of Hertwig, picturing pages from catalogs found in those archives; the catalogs were undated, but Theriaults stated that they stretched from the early 1900s through the 1930s. This is a copy of one of the pages in the book, featuring these two nubile nixies.

The "Sp." suffix was originally used by Limbach Porzellanfabrik, however, in 1922, Limbach was struggling financially and Hertwig took a controlling interest in the company. This would explain how what were originally Limbach models ended up in Hertwig's catalogs.