Cream Jug
Dateca. 1790
Maker
The Downshire Pottery
(1787 - 1806)
MediumLead-glazed earthenware
DimensionsOH: 4 9/16 in.; OD (widest point of body) 3 3/8 in.; OL: 4 7/8 in. (11.6 × 8.6 × 12.4cm)
Credit LineMuseum Purchase, C. Thomas Hamlin III Fund
Object number2020-132
DescriptionLead-glazed earthenware (pearlware) cream jug: slightly spreading foot rises to bulbous pear-shaped body with sparrow beak spout opposite pulled ear-shaped handle. The jug decorated in blue and manganese with floral sprays and sprigs on the body and a border of a blue line between a concentric scalloped swag and three-dot border and a cross-hatched dot-diaper border. The top of the handle painted with a row of blue bell flowers.Label TextFounded in 1787 by Thomas Greg, Samuel Stephenson and John Ashmore, the Downshire Pottery in Belfast, Ireland, survived two main phases before closing around 1808. Because they were closely copying wares from Staffordshire, it is often difficult to attribute pieces to the pottery. But this cream jug is a rare survival that closely matches the form and decoration of fragments of other cream jugs recovered from the Downshire Pottery site with a very distinctive blue and brown decoration and running manganese often associated with the fragments, as well. The "running" manganese brown reveals this piece was fired upside down.
