Tankard

Date1745-1770

MediumStoneware, salt-glazed, white with blue

DimensionsOverall: 5 1/4 x 3 5/8 x 4 3/4in. (13.3 x 9.2 x 12.1cm)

Credit LineMuseum Purchase, Wesley and Elise H. Wright in memory of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Clay Hofheimer II and in honor of John C. Austin

Object number2008-13

DescriptionSalt-glazed stoneware tankard with extruded handle with a pinched terminal. Ornamented with incised decoration depicting a single flower and leaves. The incised decoration is filled with cobalt blue in what is typically referred to as scratch blue decoration.
Label TextBy the 1720s, potters began to embellish white stoneware with incised lines colored brown. Known today as “scratch brown,” such wares are rarely found in early America. Scratch blue, however, was extremely popular from the mid 1740s onward. Both variations featured floral and linear designs and border patterns cut into the still damp clay of unfired wares. These lines were then filled with iron for brown or cobalt for blue which, when fired, created a pleasing color within the carved motifs. Writing in 1829, the early Staffordshire historian Simeon Shaw described the manufacture of scratch blue as being primarily practiced by women, stating, “The Flowerers now scratched the jugs and tea ware, with a sharp pointed nail, and filled the interstices with ground zaffre [a form of cobalt].” Scratch blue items were widely offered for sale in colonial newspapers, where they were listed among “white, blue and white, and enamelled stone ware.” Fragments of straight-sided drinking vessels and pitchers enhanced with scratch blue decoration are frequently recovered at archaeological sites dating from about 1745 to 1780. Characteristically, specimens are ornamented with patterns of stylized grass or lush floral designs.
ProvenanceMuseum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, Winston-Salem, North Carolina - acquired by Frank Horton in 1964 for their collection.

Exhibition(s)