Figure 2. — Sketch of sherd of sgraffito-ware dish, 

 dating about 1670, that was found during excava- 

 tions of C. H. Brannam's pottery in Barnstaple. 

 (Sketch by Mrs. Constance Christian, from photo.) 



lamestown, is of similar paste and quality of temper. 

 It has a roughly oval beehive shape with a trapezoidal 

 framed opening in which a pottery door fits snugly. 



Following the initial discoveries at Jamestown there 

 was considerable speculation about these two types. 

 Worth Bailey, then museum technician at Jamestown, 

 was the first to recognize the source of the sgraffito 

 ware as ''Devonshire.'" Henry Chandlee Forman, 

 asserting that such ware was "undoubtedly made in 

 England," felt that it "derives its inspiration from 

 Majolica ware . . . especially that of the early 

 Renaissance period from Faenza." ^ 



Bailey also noted that the oven and the gravel- 

 tempered utensils were made of identical clay and 

 temper. However, in an attempt to prove that 

 earthenware was produced locally, he assumed, per- 

 haps because of their crudeness, that the utensils 

 were made at Jamestown. This led him to con- 

 jecture that the oven, ha\ing similar ceramic qualities. 



was also a local product. He felt in support of this 

 that it was doubtful "so fragile an object could have 

 survived a perilous sea voyage."^ 



Since these opinions were expressed, much further 

 archcological work in colonial sites has revealed 

 widespread distribution of the two types. Bailey 

 himself noted that a pottery oven is intact and in 

 place in the John Bowne House in Flushing, Long 

 Island. A fragment of another pottery oven recently 

 has been identified among the artifacts excavated by 

 Sidney Strickland from the site of the John Howland 

 House, near Plymouth, Massachusetts; and gravel- 

 tempered utensil sherds have occurred in many sites. 

 The sgraffito ware has been unearthed in Virginia, 

 Maryland, and Massachusetts. 



Such a wide distribution of either type implies a 

 productive European source for each, rather than a 

 local American kiln in a struggling colonial settlement 

 like Jamestown. Bailey's attribution of the sgraffito 

 ware to Devonshire was confirmed in 1950 when 

 J. C. Harrington, archeologist of the National Park 

 Service, came upon certain evidence at Barnstaple in 

 North Devon, England. This evidence was found in 

 the form of sherds exhibited in a display window of 

 C;. H. Brannam's Barnstaple Pottery that were un- 

 covered during excavation work on the premises. 

 These are unmistakably related in technique and de- 

 sign to the American examples. A label under a 

 fragment of a large deep dish (fig. 2) in the display 

 is inscribed: "Piece of dish found in site of pottery. 

 In sgraffiato. About 1670." This clue opened the 

 way to the investigation pursued here, the results of 

 which relate the sgraffito ware, the gravel-tempered 

 ware, and the ovens to the North Devon towns and to 

 a busy commerce in earthenware between Barnstaple, 

 Bideford, and the New World. 



This study, conducted at first hand only on the 

 American side of the Atlantic, is admittedly incom- 

 plete. Later, it is planned to consider sherd collec- 

 tions in England, comparative types of sgraffito wares, 

 and possible influences and sources of techniques and 

 designs. For the present, it is felt the immediate 

 evidence is sufficient to warrant the conclusions 

 drawn here. 



The author is under special obligation to J. C. Har- 

 rington, chief of interpretation, Region I, National 

 Park Service, who discovered the North De\on wares 



' Worth Bailey, "Concerning Jamestown Pottery — Its Past 

 and Present," Ceramic Age, October 1939, pp. 101-104. 



- H. C. Forman, Jamestown and Saint Mar/s, Baltimore, 1938, 

 p. 133. 



3 Worth Bailey, "A Jamestown Baking Oven of the Seven- 

 teenth Century," William and Mary College Qiiarlerly Historical 

 Magazine, 1937, ser. 2, vol. 17, no. 4, pp. 496-500. 



20 



BULLETIN 225: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



