Jug: C.2084-1928

Maker(s)

Production: Unidentified Westerald pottery

Entities

• Jug
• Kugelbauchkanne

Categories

• Stoneware
• Salt-glazed stoneware
• German stoneware

Description

Grey salt-glazed stoneware with impressed, and applied relief decoration, painted before glazing in blue and manganese-purple: half-figures of a woman and a man wearing the Order of the Golden Fleece; and two medallions enclosing the arms of a bishop, the date '1683', and motto 'NEC.TEMERE.NEC.TIMIDE', and, at the bottom of one medallion, the initials 'WR'.

Grey stoneware, thrown, with applied handle, impressed, and applied moulded relief decoration, painted in cobalt-blue and manganese-purple before salt-glazing. The jug has an almost globular body contracting at the top into a cylindrical neck with a pinched lip, and a horizontal cordon level with the top of the applied handle which has a vertical groove and a curled up 'kick' at its lower end. The shoulder is encircled by a row of blue arches enclosing impressed flower heads with manganese-purple centres. On the front is an oval applied medallion with richly dressed half-figures of a woman (L) and a man (R) wearing the Order of the Golden Fleece (probably the Stadholder William of Orange and his wife Mary Stuart), with a winged cherub's head above, a carnation or pink below, and a border of foliated scrolls. The figures and border are coloured manganese with a blue ground and outer border. On either side there are rampant lions in relief coloured manganese within scalloped blue borders. On both sides there is an oval medalllion with a blue border, enclosing the arms of a bishop with above the date '1683', and the motto, 'NEC .TEMERE.NEC.TIMIDE' (neither rashly nor timidly), picked out in manganese and blue. At the bottom of the medallion on the right side are the initials 'WR'. There are two blue horizontal bands round the neck, and a vertical line with sloping strokes on either side down the back of the handle.

Notes

History note: Sotheby's, 18 June, 1928, lot 34; bought by the auctioneer for £10 on behalf of Dr J.W.L. Glaisher, FRS, Trinity College, Cambidge

Legal notes

Dr J. W. L. Glaisher Bequest

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Bequeathed (1928-12-07) by Glaisher, J. W. L., Dr

Dating

17th Century, Late
Production date: dated AD 1683 : The mould for the relief was made in 1683; the jug could have been made in that year or possibly a year or so later

Note

A jug of similar type can be seen in a painting by Abraham Diepraem of Dordrecht (d. 1670) in the National gallery London.

Attributed to Bouffioulx in Belgium in Rackham's Catalogue of the Glaisher Collection . . . (1935), but probably made in the Westerwald, where round-bellied jugs with various comparable medallions of coat-of-arms, busts of rulers, and biblical subjects, were made during the second half of the 17th century.

School or Style

Baroque