Description: English plain white salt-glazed coffee cup with a slightly flaring lip, straight sides, curved base, and attached coil handle with a pinched terminal. Tea was not the only beverage served in rural New England. Coffee, chocolate, punch, and fortified wines like port or madeira all played roles during refined gatherings. This small cup, which was used both for coffee and chocolate, is a rare survival of a common, 18th century form. The tape label on the base of this cup reads "MONAHON" and a paper label inside the cup reads "(RI family)." Shards of a white salt-glazed coffee cup similar to this early example, which was found in Rhode Island, were excavated in an archaeological dig at Frary House in 1978. Although Staffordshire white stoneware had been perfected by about 1720, its possibilities for mass-production were not fully exploited until the 1740s. Then the techniques of press-moulding, slip-casting and enamelling were developed, and the drabness of the greyish stoneware surface was successfully relieved by the addition of all-over decoration.
Subjects: Pottery; glaze (coating by location); Stoneware Link to share this object record: https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+91.075 |