Description:
English salt-glazed stoneware, depressed, globular-shaped teapot and cover, the wheel-thrown body is attached to a molded crabstock handle and spout, and circular inset cover with a globular knop with a hole in center, the cover is connected to the handle with a hammered metal link chain. The chain was a later addition and links the teapot cover to the handle to prevent loss. There are four stilt marks on the base. The teapot is covered with a vivid cobalt obtained by dipping the green ware (before firing) into a mixture of ground zaffre (a blue pigment obtained by roasting cobalt ore), flint and clay with water (a very fusible slip) before salt glazing in the kiln. Except for some drips and smudges of cobalt, the interior and base are white. This is a good example of "Littler/Wedgwood blue" (traditionally called "Littler's blue") one of the few subsets of salt-glazed stoneware that can be identified by the makers, William Littler (1724-1784) and his brother-in-law, Aaron Wedgwood (1718-1782) of Burslem who married Sarah Littler in 1738. Littler and Wedgwood were in partnership at Brownhills, Staffordshire, before Littler left for the Longton Hall porcelain factory where he became a partner in 1751. The earliest reference to purchases of blue wares from Wedgwood/Littler appears in the 1749 sale account book of Jonah Malkin, the brother-in-law of Thomas and John Wedgwood of Big House, Burslem, who were in turn Aaron Wedgwood's cousins; those purchases continued to be recorded until 1763, during much of which time Littler was working at Longton Hall. Such rich blue surface was akin to the products of the porcelain factory at Sevres. Very few archaeological shards of Littler's blue decorated stoneware have been found in New England - with only one shard discovered in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+66.138 |
