English Delftware
Encyclopedia
English delftware is tin-glazed pottery
Tin-glazed pottery
Tin-glazed pottery is a majolica pottery covered in glaze containing tin oxide which is white, shiny and opaque. The pottery body is usually made of red or buff colored earthenware and the white glaze was often used to imitate Chinese porcelain...

 made in the British Isles between about 1550 and the late 18th century. The main centres of production were London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, Bristol
Bristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...

 and Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...

 with smaller centres at Wincanton
Wincanton
Wincanton is a small town in south Somerset, southwest England. The town lies on the A303 road, the main route between London and South West England, and has some light industry...

, Glasgow
Glasgow
Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

 and Dublin.

English tin-glazed pottery was called "galleyware" and its makers "gallypotters" until the early 18th century; it was given the name delftware
Delftware
Delftware, or Delft pottery, denotes blue and white pottery made in and around Delft in the Netherlands and the tin-glazed pottery made in the Netherlands from the 16th century....

after the popular tin-glazed pottery from the Netherlands.

Early wares

An English delftware jug has been found in East Malling, Kent, with a silver mount hallmark
Hallmark
A hallmark is an official mark or series of marks struck on items made of precious metals — platinum, gold, silver and in some nations, palladium...

ed 1550, which is presumed to be the earliest date of manufacture. (Malling jugs may be seen in the London Museum
London Museum
The London Museum was inaugurated on 21 March 1912 by King George V with Queen Mary and Princess Mary and Prince George at Kensington Palace. It opened for public visitation on 8 April, admitting more than 13.000 visitors during the day. Two years later the collections were removed to Lancaster...

 and the Victoria and Albert Museum
Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum , set in the Brompton district of The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, England, is the world's largest museum of decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 4.5 million objects...

.)

John Stow
John Stow
John Stow was an English historian and antiquarian.-Early life:The son of Thomas Stow, a tallow-chandler, he was born about 1525 in London, in the parish of St Michael, Cornhill. His father's whole rent for his house and garden was only 6s. 6d. a year, and Stow in his youth fetched milk every...

's Survey of London (1598) records the arrival in 1567 of two Antwerp potters, Jasper Andries and Jacob Jansen, in Norwich
Norwich
Norwich is a city in England. It is the regional administrative centre and county town of Norfolk. During the 11th century, Norwich was the largest city in England after London, and one of the most important places in the kingdom...

, where they made "Gally Paving Tiles, and vessels for Apothecaries and others, very artificially". In 1570 Jansen applied to Queen Elizabeth I for the sole right to practice "galleypotting" in London and soon set up a workshop at Aldgate
Aldgate
Aldgate was the eastern most gateway through London Wall leading from the City of London to Whitechapel and the east end of London. Aldgate gives its name to a ward of the City...

 to the east of the city. There were already other Flemish potters in London, two of them in Southwark
Southwark
Southwark is a district of south London, England, and the administrative headquarters of the London Borough of Southwark. Situated east of Charing Cross, it forms one of the oldest parts of London and fronts the River Thames to the north...

 recorded in 1571 as "painters of pottes".

English delftware pottery and its painted decoration is similar in many respects to that from Holland, but its peculiarly English quality has been commented upon: ". . . there is a relaxed tone and a sprightliness which is preserved throughout the history of English delftware; the overriding mood is provincial and naïve rather than urbane and sophisticated." Caiger-Smith describes its mood as "ingenuous, direct, sometimes eccentric"; and Garner talks of its "quite distinctive character". Its methods and techniques were simpler than those of its continental counterparts. English tin-glaze potters rarely used the transparent overglaze applied by the more sophisticated Dutch and Italian potters. The enamels so popular on the continent in the 18th century were used only for a short time at Liverpool, where the so-called Fazackerly wares were made.

Many everyday wares were made: paving tiles, mugs, drug jars, dishes, wine bottles, posset
Posset
A posset was a British hot drink of milk curdled with wine or ale, often spiced, which was popular from medieval times to the 19th century...

 pots, salt pots, candlesticks, fuddling cups (that is, ale mugs joined in groups of three, four or five with connecting holes to confuse the drinker), puzzle jugs (similar to fuddling cups), barber's bowls, pill slabs, bleeding bowls, porringer
Porringer
A porringer is a small dish from which Europeans and colonial Americans ate their gruel or porridge, or other soft foods.Porringers were shallow bowls, between 4" to 6" in diameter, and 1½" to 3" deep; the form originates in the medieval period in Europe and they were made in wood, ceramic, pewter...

s, and flower bricks.

Large decorative dishes were popular. The earliest known piece with an English inscription is a dish dated 1600 in the London Museum. It is painted in blue, purple, green, orange and yellow and depicts the Tower of London and Old London Bridge, surrounded by the words, "THE ROSE IS RED THE LEAVES ARE GRENE GOD SAVE ELIZABETH OUR QUEENE" and an Italianate border of masks and leaves. The rim is decorated with dashes of blue and can be considered the first in series of large decorated dishes so painted and called blue-dash chargers.

Blue-dash chargers

Blue-dash chargers, usually between about 25 and 35 cm in diameter with abstract, floral, religious, patriotic or topographical motifs, were produced in quantity by London and Bristol potters until the early 18th century. As they were kept for decoration on walls, dressers and side-tables, many have survived and they are well represented in museum collections.

One of the most popular decorations on the blue-dash charger was a representation of Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve were, according to the Genesis creation narratives, the first human couple to inhabit Earth, created by YHWH, the God of the ancient Hebrews...

 with the serpent in the Garden of Eden, produced from the 1630s to the 1730s. "The challenge of rendering the anatomy of Adam and Eve was inescapable, and as the subject became more and more freely repeated by painters of less and less competence, most of the anatomy gave trouble, particularly Adam's abdominal muscles, which eventually became grotesque and could not be wholly covered by his fig-leaf." In later examples, "the images had declined to the level of coloured graffiti; Adam and Eve were cave dwellers, the Tree had become a mere cipher and only the serpent and the fruit proved simple enough to survive debasement."

Later wares

Towards the end of the 17th changing taste led to the replacement of apothecary pots, paving tiles and large dishes by polite tablewares, delicate ornaments, punch bowls
Punch (drink)
Punch is the term for a wide assortment of drinks, both non-alcoholic and alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice. The drink was introduced from India to England in the early seventeenth century; from there its use spread to other countries...

, teapots, cocoa pots and coffee-pots. The decoration became lighter and more informal. Changing taste was also reflected in chinoiserie
Chinoiserie
Chinoiserie, a French term, signifying "Chinese-esque", and pronounced ) refers to a recurring theme in European artistic styles since the seventeenth century, which reflect Chinese artistic influences...

 decoration and greater use of a polychrome palette.

In Bristol and Lambeth from the mid-18th century there was much use of a technique imported from Italy, bianco sopra bianco (white-on-white). The object was covered in a tin-glaze tinted with a small amount of colouring oxide, with decoration over it in white tin-glaze.

The development of a very white earthenware by Wedgwood
Wedgwood
Wedgwood, strictly speaking Josiah Wedgwood and Sons, is a pottery firm owned by KPS Capital Partners, a private equity company based in New York City, USA. Wedgwood was founded on May 1, 1759 by Josiah Wedgwood and in 1987 merged with Waterford Crystal to create Waterford Wedgwood, an...

 spelled the end of English delftware. Decoration could be applied to the bisque
Bisque
Bisque may refer to:* Bisque , a piece of unglazed pottery* Bisque , a thick, creamy soup made from puréed seafood or vegetables* Bisque, a free turn in a handicap croquet match* Bisque, a free point in a handicap real tennis match...

 ware from printed transfers, white pottery could be produced with a clear lead
Lead
Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...

-glaze, and the result was pottery lighter and more durable than tin-glazed ware. The north Staffordshire potteries also introduced industrial techniques that disadvantaged the delftware makers , and by the 19th century tin-glazed earthenware almost died out until its revival in the form of art pottery a hundred years later.

Collections

There are good examples of English delftware in the Victoria and Albert Museum
Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum , set in the Brompton district of The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, England, is the world's largest museum of decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 4.5 million objects...

, the British Museum
British Museum
The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

, the Ashmolean Museum
Ashmolean Museum
The Ashmolean Museum on Beaumont Street, Oxford, England, is the world's first university museum...

 and the Fitzwilliam Museum
Fitzwilliam Museum
The Fitzwilliam Museum is the art and antiquities museum of the University of Cambridge, located on Trumpington Street opposite Fitzwilliam Street in central Cambridge, England. It receives around 300,000 visitors annually. Admission is free....

.
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