Description:
Italian earthenware costrel with marbled slip decoration, the thrown form has an elongated narrow neck with bulbous spout, the body is round in form with two separately applied lugs on either side; the base is tall with a rounded rim edge; the surface of the costrel has been decorated with the application of white, orange, and red slip, which have then been marbled; the underside of the base has several modern paper labels, one for English ceramics dealer, Garry Atkins, and another white label inscribed with inventory numbers including "Italian c. 1600" Earthenware costrels, bottles, or pilgrim flasks from Italy are found occasionally on 17th-century colonial American sites. The form exhibits a long, narrow neck with either a rounded or baluster-shaped body on a turned foot. It has integral attachment lugs—often in the shape of stylized lion heads—on each side of the body, through which a cord can be looped. Slip-decorated earthenware costrels are made of the red-firing alluvial clays of northern Italy, particularly from the vicinity of Pisa. In the 16th and 17th centuries the area along the Arno River between Pisa and Montelupo was the largest producer of exported Italian pottery. The Arno empties into the Ligurian Sea allowing easy distribution of the wares through the Mediterranean to northwest Europe and even to the Americas. This type of costrel is refered to as “North Italian marbled slipware,” since two or more colors of slip or liquid clay are swirled together on the surface of the vessel to create a marbled appearance. The colors can be a mix of just white and red or include a polychrome palette of orange, brown, and green (which is intended to resemble marble.) Fragments of Italian slipware have been found at Jamestown, Charles Towne (Charleston), SC; fragments from Hollister site, Glastonbury, CT; Chadbourne Site in South Berwick, Maine, Boston, MA near the Revere House in the North End, and the base to a costrel has been recovered at Jamestown, VA.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+2020.4.5 |
