These images are provided for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons License (BY-NC-ND). To license a high resolution version, please contact our image library who will discuss fees, terms and waivers.
Download this imageCreative commons explained - what it means, how you can use our's and other people's content.
Tile with five ruby birds
Maker:
William De Morgan & Co.
Designer:
De Morgan, William Frend
Square buff earthenware tile, covered with white slip and decorated with ruby and pink lustre. Divided into nine squares, alternating large-beaked birds with beady eye and raised wing and box-tree sprays. The earthenware is quite coarse and the sides of the tile rough and unglazed.
History note: Given by Mr H C Mossop, 1941
Given by Mr H C Mossop
Width: 15.5 cm
Width: 6.125 in
Method of acquisition: Given (1941-03-26) by Mossop, H. C.
19th Century, Late#
1888
CE
-
1898
CE
William Frend De Morgan (1839-1917), now widely regarded as the most important ceramicist of the Arts & Crafts movement, also worked in stained glass and became a successful novelist. The son of a non-conformist mathematics professor, he became a close friend of William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones and married the Pre-Raphaelite painter Evelyn Pickering (1855-1919), in 1887. As a ceramicist, De Morgan was primarily a designer/decorator and chemist, working on bought-in blanks or pots thrown to his design. He experimented widely with techniques and glazes, re-discovering methods for making and applying lustres and the colours of Iznik and Persian pottery and using them for a range of complex fantasy designs featuring ships, birds, flora and animals. This design dates from 1872-81, when De Morgan was first producing lustre-ware in Chelsea. The tile was made later, at Sands End, Fulham, when he was in partnership with the architect Halsey Ricardo. The coarse earthenware and rough sides indicate that the tile was intended for a fireplace or other architectural use. De Morgan made many, many designs for tiles and tile panels – some 820 are in the V&A collection.
Decoration composed of lustre ( pink and ruby) clear glaze
coarse, buff-coloured Earthenware
Slip-coating : Earthenware, slip-coated, glazed and decorated with lustre
Inscription present: in a circle surrounding a rosette
Accession number: EC.5-1941
Primary reference Number: 15315
Stable URI
Owner or interested party:
The Fitzwilliam Museum
Associated department:
Applied Arts
This record can be cited in the Harvard Bibliographic style using the text below:
Mirador deep zoom
IIIF Manifest
The Fitzwilliam Museum (2024) "Tile with five ruby birds" Web page available at: https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/15315 Accessed: 2024-04-27 01:41:09
To cite this record on Wikipedia you can use this code snippet:
{{cite web|url=https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/15315
|title=Tile with five ruby birds
|author=The Fitzwilliam Museum|accessdate=2024-04-27 01:41:09|publisher=The
University of Cambridge}}
To call these data via our API (remember this needs to be authenticated) you can use this code snippet:
https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/api/v1/objects/object-15315
To use this as a simple code embed, copy this string:
<div class="text-center">
<figure class="figure">
<img src="https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/imagestore/aa/aa37/large_EC_5_1941_201402_adn21_dc2.jpg"
alt="Tile with five ruby birds"
class="img-fluid" />
<figcaption class="figure-caption text-info">Tile with five ruby birds</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
Accession Number: EC.6-1941
Accession Number: C.67-1992
Accession Number: EC.4-1941
Accession Number: C.2095-1928
Updates about future exhibitions and displays, family activities, virtual events & news. You'll be the first to know...
