POTTERY 



Countries and Germany, where it 

 was largely made in the 16th cen- 

 tury.^ Generally it is classed 

 under the title Orts de flandres or 

 Cologne ware, the chief centres 

 of manufacture being Siegburg, 

 Raeren, and Cologne. The ware 

 was finished in the natural colour 

 of the clay, and was glazed during 

 the firing with salt. Some has been 

 decorated with painted bands of 

 purple and blue, applied on the 

 clay before firing. At Fulham was 

 established the first factory in 

 England for making stoneware. 

 This was done by John Dwight in 

 1611. He made fine busts and 

 statuettes as well as ordinary use- 

 ful pieces. Mortlake followed on 

 the same lines in 1752. Fine salt- 



lazed stoneware was made in 

 taffordshire, Burslem being the 

 centre of manufacture, and pro- 

 ducing pieces as early as 1690. By 

 a similar progression the ceramic 

 art made its way East. As earthen- 

 ware and faience developed in the 

 West, so porcelain more especially 

 occupied the Oriental potters. 



Chinese Porcelain 



The Chinese must have the 

 credit of being the real inventors 

 of porcelain. Various dates are 

 assigned ; it is, however, certain 

 that great perfection was attained 

 during the Ming dynasty, 1368 

 1644, when they produced the won- 

 derful sang de bceuf and peach- 

 bloom effects. Early specimens of 

 porcelain treated with simple 

 cobalt-blue designs were exported 

 toevery civilized country and found 

 their way into Europe, which 

 resulted in the manufacture of 

 porcelain by potters in almost every 

 Western country. 



The potters of Japan followed 

 mainly on the lines laid down by 

 the Chinese, but they proved them- 

 selves by far the most progressive 

 of Orientals, as they coupled with 

 their native taste and manual 

 dexterity a ready acceptance of 

 Western ideas. So versatile a 

 people produced potters who soon 

 began to realize the plastic pro- 

 perties of clay, and every variety 

 was seized upon to express the 

 artist's thoughts, the outcome 

 being a great advance in earthen- 

 ware and stoneware lines also. 



France preceded Germany in the 

 production of porcelain, but before 

 the discovery of the true clay it 

 was artificially composed ; the 

 first soft paste was made at St. 

 Cloud about 1698. In 1740 a fac- 

 tory was established at Vincennes, 

 which was shortly after removed to 

 Sevres. Soft paste only was made 

 up to 1768, when the true clay was 

 discovered. True porcelain, made 

 as the Chinese wares, was a dis- 

 tinction long left to Dresden. 



6298 



The year when porcelain was 

 first made in England is not 

 known, but Chelsea wares stand 

 first in point of time, the earliest 

 known pieces being dated 1745, at 

 which period it showed good work- 

 manship in a marked degree. Its 

 paste was artificial and harder than 

 Sevres. London also made porce- 

 lain at Bow, which probably 

 originated with a patent taken out 

 by Heylyn and Frye in 1744. The 

 whole of the plant and stock was 

 purchased in 1770 by William 

 Duesbury, and transferred to the 

 Derby works, which had probably 

 been in existence some years, as a 

 sale of Derby wares took place in 

 London in 1756. Great progress 

 was made under the proprietorship 

 of Duesbury, who also purchased 

 the Chelsea works, where was pro- 

 duced the china known as Chelsea- 

 Derby, or Chels,a models made in 

 Derby paste. 



Worcester possesses one of the 

 factories that made porcelain in the 

 18th century. John Wall, in 1751, 

 discovered the secret of making 

 porcelain. Many of his fellow- 

 citizens approached him with 

 a view of purchasing his invention, 

 and the result was the forming of 

 the Worcester Porcelain Co. In 

 1755 William Cookworthy dis- 

 covered the true kaolin or china 

 clay in Cornwall, which was 

 quickly and extensively used at 

 Worcester. Besides this, Cook- 

 worthy started a factory at Ply- 

 mouth about 1768, which carried 

 on only three years and was then 

 transferred to Bristol. Plymouth 

 paste was a true hard porcelain, 

 and Bristol body is the hardest 

 known, harder even than the ideal 

 Chinese ware. These works were 

 closed in 1781. 



Enamelled Ware 



There is also an influence in 

 Europe which shows that the pro- 

 ductions in pottery in India and 

 central Asia found their way West. 

 The origin of Indian pottery is 

 obscure, but almost every village 

 had its potter's field and craftsmen, 

 the variety of work being very 

 great, though the style is similar. 

 Persian pottery has a rough sandy 

 body, coated with a siliceous 

 enamel, semi-opaque ; beautiful 

 specimens date from the 15th cen- 

 tury. Damascus has given name 

 to a large section of enamelled 

 wares, whether they emanated from 

 that city or not ; this ware was 

 largely imported into Europe in 

 the 15th century, and it deserves 

 special mention, as no doubt it 

 kindled the spark of emulation 

 which gave Italy the glorious 

 works of Gubbio and Faenza. 

 Rhodes and the neighbouring 

 islands, as also the Arabs or Sara- 



POTTERY 



cens, produced ware with bold 

 designs and beautiful colourings 

 during the 16th century. 



During the whole of the 19th 

 century pottery manufacture in- 

 creased by leaps and bounds in 

 every country ; the introduction 

 of machinery added tremendously 

 to the output, and processes too 

 numerous to mention were invent- 

 ed ; but on the whole it may be 

 said that they all centred around 

 and developed and enlarged those 

 of the late 18th century. Sevres 

 and Dresden have both carried 

 on to the present day, and so also 

 have Wedgwood and the Worcester 

 factories. The old Derby works 

 ceased and a new factory took its 

 place, and such well-known names 

 as Spode, afterwards and still Cope- 

 lands, Minton, and Doulton were 

 started and still exist. 



POTTERY MANUFACTURE. Clay 

 exists in many districts owing 

 to the decomposition or disinte- 

 gration of stone, but for pottery it 

 is seldom used in its natural state. 

 Admixtures of all kinds of material 

 are used by different manufac- 

 turers, but in the main calcined 

 bone, kaolin or china clay, Cornish 

 stone, and flint are the founda- 

 tion of all mixtures. 



Preparation oJ Clay 



The clay must be washed and 

 prepared before it is fit for use by 

 the potter. Clay so prepared need 

 only be mingled with water, but 

 all hard materials, flint, stone, 

 bone, etc., need to be finely ground. 

 Flints are calcined, which renders 

 them pure in colour and lessens 

 their toughness, so that they can 

 be crushed ready for the mill. This 

 consists of a pan or large vat, the 

 bottom paved with hard chert 

 stones ; in the centre revolves a 

 shaft with powerful arms, each pro- 

 pelling a block of stone which 

 travels continuously over the atone 

 paving. The broken material is 

 put into the vat with water, and 

 the whole ground to an impalpable 

 cream, called slip. 



This process takes from two to 

 eight days. When the substance 

 has reached a sufficient degree of 

 fineness it is run off and sifted 

 through a silk lawn. Each ma- 

 terial is ground separately. Then 

 comes the slip-house, where the 

 mingling of the different materials 

 is carried out. When the mixing- 

 tank has received its proper quan- 

 tity, the whole is freely agitated 

 and passed through channels con- 

 taining magnets, so that every 

 particle of iron may be abstracted. 

 This slip has now to be converted 

 into clay, which is effected by 

 pressure. The clay-press contains 

 a number of flat chambers, each 

 lined with linen and screwed firmly 



