From the 19th to 20th centuries, artifacts from around the world were increasingly gathered in European museums and curio shops. When painters and sculpters discovered things like sub-saharan african masks, mesoamerican temples, oceanic tiki sculptures, ancient cycladic figurines, japanese woodblock prints, and islamic geometric designs, it had a huge impact on them. Artists like Maurice de Vlaminck and Pablo Picasso would go on to riff on these as Cubism and other forms. Modernist artists and designers such as Mondrian were really just re-discovering forms of art that other cultures had established.
I'm no art historian, but according to the website, that fragment is a tin-glaze patchwork mosaic on the inside of a plate or bowl. Since it's 16th century this is probably an Italian Majolica plate, whose origins are an area of Sicily known for a Moorish method of glazing pottery. These designs were inspired by Islamic art from Andalusia (http://www.islamicspain.tv/Arts-and-Science/The-Culture-of-A...) and adapted over time to European imagery and patterns (though patchwork mosaics in general are about 5,000 years old)
Maybe life doesn't suck. Today: canal trash is credits cards, cell phones and Megaman. The past: fishing hooks, spear heads, a nazi coin and nothing more fun than tobacco pipes and dice.
Amazingly Mondrian even.
https://belowthesurface.amsterdam/en/vondst/NZD1.00092CER059...