Scottish shepherdess: C.876-1984

Titles

Scottish shepherdess

Maker(s)

Production: Dudson (Perhaps)

Entities

• Figure
• Victorian Staffordshire figure
• Flat-backed figure

Categories

• Lead-glazed earthenware

Description

White earthenware figure, press-moulded in three parts with white shredded clay added as decoration, and lead glazed. Painted underglaze in cobalt blue, and with black, brown, green, yellow, orange, red, pink and flesh-pink enamels, and gilt.

The shepherdess stands on a rock above two recumbent sheep. She rests her right hand on a rock. The figure is well coloured. She wears a blue bodice and a full yellow skirt which is finely painted with orange and green spots and dark pink flowers, also: an orange sash, trimmed with green, and a hat with a green feather. An orange water bladder hangs at her right side. Her hair is long. The sheep are white with orange-brown patches; an impressed pattern suggests fur. The oval-rectangular base has a gilt line across the front; the top is moulded and coloured to suggest rough ground, in yellow and green, with patches of brown and two clumps of multi-coloured shredded clay ‘parsley’ vegetation just below the skirt. The underside is concave and glazed. The back is flat and undecorated, with some vertical comb marks in the clay and a vent hole 12 cm from the bottom.

Notes

History note: From the collection of the late Colonel R.G. Turner.

Legal notes

Given by Mrs J E Cameron 1984, from the collection of the late Col R G Turner

Place(s) associated

• Hanley ⪼ Staffordshire ⪼ England

Acquisition and important dates

Method of acquisition: Given (1984) by Cameron, J.E., Mrs

Dating

19th Century, Mid#
Victorian
Circa 1850 CE - Circa 1865 CE

Note

The flat, undecorated backs and the use of cobalt blue underglaze suggest they were made between 1850 and 1865. Though undoubtedly a pair, the decoration of the shepherdess is slightly more detailed than that on the male figure – notably the fine painting on the skirt and the addition of painted shredded clay clumps (or ‘parsley’) on the rocks. There were many manufacturers of figures working in Staffordshire at this time, but these features, the shape of the face and the painting of the eyes, with a central dot and a single, curved black line above, suggest that the figures may have been made by Dudson. The Dudson factory was founded in 1800 and at this time operated in Hope Street, Hanley. It made a wide range of products, and is still in business today, though Dudson Staffordshire figures were only produced between around 1815 and 1865. The small red-brown marks on the undersides may assist future identification.

This figure is one of a pair, the companion being a similarly posed Scottish shepherd with two sheep. The two are somewhat similar in dress and pose to figures of Rob Roy Macgregor and his wife Helen. Rob Roy, a real grazier who maintained a band of armed followers to protect his herds, was the hero of Walter Scott’s eponymous novel and of various nineteenth century operatic dramas. However, Rob Roy and Helen figures generally carry shields decorated with a thistle. This pair may be simply a generic Scottish shepherd couple derived from similar models.

School or Style

Victorian