POTTERY 



early Greek vanes, that the vane ait well as the 

 statuary figure had its origin in the human form. 

 On these early vases the head, 

 hands, and oilier members are 

 figured, atid the body of the vase is 

 only an exaggerated human trunk. 



Attyrtaii. In the contemporary 

 eni|iires of Assyria and Babylon 

 pottery was also in use at an early 

 JR-riod. Sun dried mid kiln dried 

 bricks were made nlxiut 2000 B.C., 

 and like Kgyptian bricks these were 

 stam|H>il with the names and titles 

 of the reigning monarch*, and the 

 gled Ifcyp" ' oca " t y f r which they were destined, 

 tian Bottle in Glazed hricks of various colours, 

 the British occasionally enriched with figures of 

 Museum, men and anininU, were intro<Iuced 

 into constructions, and Seminunis is 

 said to have adorned with them thu \\alU of 

 Babylon. In these hricks we have the earliest 

 example of the employment of materials for colour- 

 ing like those now in use. The glaze, however, is 

 siliceous. Glazed polychromatic hricks were also 

 used in the construction of the walls of the palace 

 of King Darius, the contemporary of the prophet 

 Daniel, at Susa (scriptural Shushan). These 

 bricks were moulded so as to build together into 

 'ilar geometrical patterns, colossal figures of 

 men, &c. in high relief. The objects most remark- 

 able for size are the large coffins found at Warka, 

 supposed by some to be the ' Ur of the Chaldees." 

 The Assyrians and Babylonians used terra-cotta for 

 historical and legal purposes, making cylinders, 

 hexagonal prisms, tiles and tablet* of it, on which 

 were impressed extensive writings in the cuneiform 

 character. Some of the most remarkable of these 

 tablete contain an account of the campaign of 

 Sennacherib against Jiuhra and the tributes of 

 Hezekiah ; others give a record of the flood, the 

 creation, &c. See BABYLONIA. 



I'hairirian. Contemporaneously the Hebrews 

 and I'liienieians practised the art, but of purely 

 Hebrew work few traces remain. Phoe- 

 nician pottery, however, has been abund- 

 antly excavated in Cyprus, and may be 

 taken as a type of the works of ooth 

 peoples. It is principally of a cream colour 

 and of a brick red hod\ . ornamented in 

 horizontal bands, with lines in umber and 

 red, concentric circles, and other geomet- 

 rical forms being the most common decora- 

 tion. They also moulded rude figure*. ,,i 

 deities and of domestic animals, the latter 

 having apparently been used as toys by 

 children. 



Greek. The most remarkable pottery of 

 :intii|iiity was the Greek, which seems in 

 its earliest development to have had a 

 certain allinitv with I'hu'iiician products. 

 The Creeks claimed the invention of the 

 POINT'S wheel, and the principal cities 

 OODtMted the honour of the art, which is 

 mentioned in Homer and attributed to 

 Cdio'lnis of Athens, Hy|Krhius of Corinlh. 

 or Talus the nephew of l)>dalns. The 

 (ireek vases which remain to this day, princi- 

 pally recovered from tombs in Greece and in the 

 l.imis to which ii- commerce extended, show 

 that within a few centuries the art rose from 

 ,he rude condition like that shown in prehistoric 

 pottery till it reached a perfection and variety of 

 form and a grace and dignity of decoration 'not 

 since attained by the efforts of'any people. It was 

 the triumph of pure art, for the material of which 

 the body of Greek vases is fabricated is of the 

 commonest type, and the colours the artists had at 

 their disposal were few anil simple. The archaic 



pottery of the Greeks down to about the 7th 

 century B.C. was like the rude earthenware of pre- 

 historic times. Their first improvement consisted 

 in the application of a brown glaze to the surface 

 of the ware, which enabled them to give force to 

 the incised ornament, scratched through the glaze 

 into the dillerentlv coloured liody. Next the 

 potters discovered black pigment which they could 

 apply over the brown glaze, and thus increase 

 their decorative resources by painting geometrical 

 patterns in black. By degrees the purely geometri- 

 cal forms of ornament were aliandoned, and figures 

 of animals, rising ultimately to the human figure, 

 were {minted in black silhouette on the vases, 

 some of the details being touched with white and 

 purple. In the case of the human figure faces and 

 limbs began to be expressed in white and colour on 

 the block figures painted on a red ground. Con- 

 currently, the rough clay body of the vases began 

 to be wholly or partially covered with an engobe or 

 slip of clay of much liner quality and colour, the 

 enrobe being applied by dipping the moulded 

 article into a vessel containing the slip. \\ ith 

 these developments in material and decorative 

 variety the forms of the vases and the skill of the 

 artist draughtsman show steady and continuous 

 development. Just as the best period in Greek 

 art approached the favourite method of vase 

 decoration underwent a total change. The decora- 

 tive figures, deities and men, were traced on their 

 red and white clay surfaces ; but, instead of the 

 figures being filled up in black, the surrounding 

 space the body of the vase itself was blackened, 

 giving a black varnished background with figures 

 the colour of the underlying body. The details of 

 these figures are indicated with fine lines. Some- 

 times the faces and limbs are filled up in white, and 

 the draperies may l>e parti-coloured. At this stage 

 Greek pottery reached its greatest loveliness of 

 form and perfection of ornamentation, the drawing 

 lieing supremely refined, delicate, and spirited. 

 Among the most interesting of the Greek vases 

 which remain to us are certain of the Pauathenaic 



Fig. 16. Greek K rater. Amphora and Kylix of later style. 



amphorre prizes won at the public games in 

 Athens on one side of which was painted an 

 archaic figure of Athena, and on the other any 

 appropriate design with the inscription : TON 

 .\OKNK6EN A6AHN. In most cases also they 

 contain the name of the archon or chief-magis- 

 trate of the city for the year, in this way enabling 

 us to find the precise date of the manufacture. Of 

 these vases ten are in the British Museum, six of 

 which l>ear the name of the archon, and the Louvre 

 possesses three, which, from the archonic names 

 they iK-ar, can be referred to .TJ:), 321, 313 B.C. 



