Samian Ware

You always find something special. Find of the day this time was my first Roman samian ware - nearly 2000 years old. This small piece of pottery was just sitting, upside down on the pebbles. As I turned it over I caught lettering in the middle of the bowl. Liking things with writing I knew it would be plopped into my bag. I assumed it was stoneware but as I looked more closely the lettering had a Roman look, so felt a little excited. What's weird is that it looks so modern, almost machine made, similar to the stuff churned out in Staffordshire from the late 18th Century. 

Mudlarking Find: Base of Roman Samian Ware 

Samian Ware(British Museum) 

Base (British Museum) 

I subsequently learnt that 'samian' potters often stamped their name in the base of their bowls. The next day my youngest helped me decipher the name TAVRICIM rising up from the base of my find, which as V's = U's in Latin is Tauricim. I found one mention in a 1895 reference book from the Musee Lyon 'inscriptions antiques'. Next to his or her name is 'Sainte-Colombe' a town in Western France - perhaps the potter was based here. 

Mudlarking Find:  Roman Samian Ware with Potters Stamp TAVRICIM. 

Samian ware or terra sigillata as it is sometimes referred to was first produced at the end of the  first century BC in Italy. By the mid 1st century AD, Gaul (modern day France & western Germany) had become the major producer. This pottery was produced and exported in vast quantities  throughout Europe and remained very popular for 250 years. At some point it was also produced on a smaller scale in Britain at Colchester and possibly London.  I can't quite comprehend how massive this industry was. There were 600 potters alone in La Graufesenque, one of the major sites of production in Gaul. The remains of one kiln measured 11.3m by 6.8m, the height an estimated 7 metres. With up to 9 internal storeys dismantled each time, the capacity is estimated at 30,000 - 40,000 vessels.  I wonder if Samian ware was the first mass produced fine table ware ever? It was refined but relatively cheap and used mainly for the presentation of food or display in its own right. 

Principal terra sigillata kiln sites(potshard.net) 

Samian ware can be plain or decorated. They look so modern because they were made in moulds. They shrank as they dried enabling fairly easy removal from the moulds. Their orangey glossy look is due to a bit of slip dipping, after which they were fired. Seemingly all rather controlled and organised there were standardised shapes and matching sets. 

South Gaulish Samian Ware showing standardisation of size (wiki)  

The decorated pieces are rather lovely. Animals and  figures depict myths and legends,  popular hunting or erotic scenes. Some fuse classical designs with native 'Gaul' traditions. As with those 19th century hunting jugs, particular designs are associated with individual potteries. The style of decoration changed over time, beginning with bands of decoration with a rather formal, precise style and ending with larger more freestyle designs. 

Decorated Samian Ware (Museum of London) 

Roman Barbotine Vessle 2nd C AD (Christies) 

Its longevity means there is tons of this stuff buried beneath us. A number of different classification systems arise from the years archaeologists have spent sorting, sifting, categorising and labelling this stuff. The potters stamps and decorative motives enable dating to within 20 years in some cases, hence samian ware with the right clues like clay pipes surrenders the date of a layer of finds. 

The rest of this particular day was characterised by tea bowls, I found yet another armorial pipe and this time coveted shard after shard of debased blue stoneware which I'm amassing with some notion of mosaic making. I was able to return Brian's 'piggy' glass seal, say goodbye to our lovely French ex archaeologist who is moving the States. I was lucky to meet Jim just before I left,  a follower of the blog,  who is over for a three week trip to the UK from the States with frequent mudlarking forages when he and his wife have time. I didn't quite remember Jim from followers on the blog, so it appears that wordpress followers don't show up on blogger. Interesting how many Americans make their way across the pond to do a bit of mudlarking.   

Annular or banded ware 1770s-1840

You'd think it was pottery from the 1950s, with those bright parallel bands of colour, in fact its probably Georgian. There seems not to be a consensus in the pottery world about this stuff, the antiques dealers tend to describe it as mocha ware, the archaeologists as annular or banded ware. 

Mudlarking Finds Banded Ware Shards

I'm not altogether sure all the pieces I've found mudlarking above and below are in fact from banded slipware, but it's my best guess so far. 

Mudlarking Finds Annular or Banded Ware

Annual or banded ware, often not distinguished from Mochaware (Rufus Foshee Antiques) 

The earthenware base could have been pearlware, whiteware or creamware decorated with clay slips. The golden age of banded ware is characterised by vibrant, earthy colours. Colourants were added to watery clay, colbalt oxide for pale blues, copper oxides produced the olive greens, antimony and uranium yielded yellows and ochres, iron oxides resulted in tans and rusts, manganese was used for black and dark browns. Lead glaze amplified the earthiness of the colours. Apparently awareness of the toxicity of some of  these compounds resulted in several being phased out. So later banded ware produced in the 1850s tended to be duller using only blacks, blues, grey and whites. 

Older Banded Ware 1790-1800 (Woolhope Club) 

The more recent: 19th Century jug (louwersantiques.com) 

Annular ware was factory made, an early product of the industrial revolution and initially produced in Staffordshire. The products were mugs, jugs and bowls. Bands of slip were applied to the vessel as it was mounted horizontally onto a lathe. The introduction of engine turned lathes from the 1770s enabled a variety of geometric designs to be used, checks,dots, fluting, zigzags, chevrons, interrupted lines. 

Mudlarking Finds Checked Slipware 

Slipware Tankard 1800 (Martyn Edgell) 

Banding was often used with other decorative techniques such as the dentric seaweed patterns on mocha ware (covered in this earlier post) or marbleware. 

Mudlarking Finds Mocha ware shards

Mocha ware with slipware bands (Rufus Foshee Antiques) 

Banded ware was the cheapest pottery with colour around, unsurprisingly they were very popular and exported in large quantities to the States. In the 1830s they were referred to as 'Fancy ceramics' although potters referred to them as 'dipped'. 

Sgraffito Slipware

The fabulous name of this slipware warrants a posting all of its own. For the uninitiated like me, sgraffito involves scratching through a layer of coloured slip to reveal the different colour of the  pottery underneath. Very rare on the Thames foreshore, to date I’ve only found one example – nice though as the lines are so obviously etched by a human hand. Tom, mudlarker from Florida recently showed me a lovely example he’d found on his most recent trip to the UK.

Thames Mudlarking: Sgraffito Medieval shard

In the late 17th century, this type of slipware was produced in North Devon. another attempt to produce more decorative items a long with Westerwald stoneware and metropolitan slipware setting them apart from the crude eathernwares in most ordinary households. 

Update: I've recently found out that this is probably Cambridgeshire Sgraffito ware, made between 1400-1500, the body was covered with white clay. After scratching the whole object was covered in a pale yellow glaze,  when fired the body turned red -  fits the bill think. Amazingly 500-600 years old. 

'Dot' Slip Ware 1670-1795

The official cute nick name of this pottery secures these rare mudlarking finds a separate post. The dots apparently were often applied to rims and necks and could be light or dark. 

Thames Mudlarking 'Dot' Slipware Pottery Shards

In the first half of the 17th century it was produced in Wrotham in Kent and in London and then Staffordshire until end of the 18th century. 

Staffordshire Slipware Posset Cup 1670-1795 (Museum of London) 

Staffordshire Type Red Slipware Posset Pot 1781-1800 (Museum of London ) 

Metropolitan slipware 1630 -1700

Slipware is essentially a type of decoration, a runny fine clay mixture is applied to clay either by painting, splashing or dripping, once it is leather hard. Sometimes the rather fabulously termed engobe (a white or coloured slip) is applied. The most common slip technique was slip-trailing, in which patterns were drawn by dripping slip through a cow’s horn or similar device. 

‘In the London area, slip-decorated pottery was used from the 16^th century onwards, inheriting a tradition for using decoratively slips of different colours that has its origins in the 12^th century. The products of local potteries and imported wares from as far away as Devon, Somerset, the Midlands, the Netherlands, Germany and Italy all found a place in the London market, where they provided some of the most attractive and affordable, decorated household ceramics available between the 16^th and 18^th centuries.’ (Museum of London)

I spot a piece of slipware on every trip to the Thames foreshore. As I laid out the slipware I’d collected, the one type I thought I had suddenly transmuted into a confusing multitude. I’d previously identified the bakewell tart lookalike Staffordshire combed slipware 1680- 1770  and marbled ware, these are quite straight forward , kept in a separate box and covered in a previous post.

Both groups looks very old. One set is dark brown almost black from afar with rather attractive raised trails of cream slip, often partially worn, I presume by the Thames. The clay bodies are brick red. The two lower dark brown pieces differ in three respects, the white slip, colour of the clay in one case white the other pinkie and the glaze only covers the top.

Mudlarking on the Thames: Slipware pottery finds

The next lot have an orangey red clay body. The background is  lighter brown,  the trailed slip appears more yellowy and the slip is different in style.

The brown I’ve discovered is a brown ‘ground’ formed by applying a slip over the clay. I’m assuming a number of these pieces are 300-400 years old Metropolitan slipware, the most common slipware in London it was produced  17 miles away in Harlow Essex. London was the obvious market, hence the name, mainly trailed white slip under a thick glossy clear glaze, which renders the white yellow. Clay with a high iron content varied in colour from light brown to bright red orange to darker red brown, with some thicker forms having a grey core. Some say only clear glaze was used, others suggest it could also be a ginger brown. Apparently it rarely extended over rim edge. The original objects were mugs, cups, candlesticks, chamber pots, salts and chaffing dishes. Vessels were wheel thrown, with heavy knife-trimming often apparent on open forms such as dishes.

Metropolitan Slipware Mug (Museum of London)

Metropolitan Slipware Dish 1630- 1700 (Museum of London) 

Alternatively one or both collections may in fact be London redware with major industries around Woolwhich and Deptford from late 17th – 18th  centuries. I’ve also read slipware was produced in Wrotham Kent.

Mocha Ware 1792- 1850

Another type of pottery looking far more modern than the period it was made. Pretty common on the Thames foreshore, at least one piece being found on most mudlarking trips.

Mocha wear pottery shards found Mudlarking on the Thames 

It took me a while to find this pottery on the internet and a while longer its name. It seems to be called ‘Mochaware’, a type of dipped ware decorated with slip. The feature which sets it apart  is clearly the fuzzy, blotting paper, sea weed like decorations. The technical name is ‘dentric’ (tree like or branching). They were thought to resemble the natural geological markings on moss agate known as ‘Mocha Stone’ (pictured below), imported from Arabia through the port of Mocha (al Mukha in Yemen) – hence the name. Apparently geological patterns were rather popular in this period.

Moss Agate (from theimage.com)

Mochaware was produced in potteries throughout Britain. It was the cheapest decorated ware available. I’ve read that most British production was exported, but clearly it was still a popular item in domestic market, in London at least. Usually used for kitchen ware, but also evidently chamber pots, one of only two images I can find of this type of mocha wear. 

Mocha wear chamber pot (from artistheanswer) 

Clearly a new technique, it was achieved by dripping a coloured acidic solution into wet alkaline slip. The colour would instantly disperse into the random dentric markings. The bodies were creamware or pearlwear, later heavier and thicker whiteware bodies were used.

The main type of mochaware I’ve found has been the yellow bodies with blue dentric markings. I’ve read this is also called ‘yellow wear’. I’ve found a few other bits of mocha which I’ll cover in a future post, hoping to pick up a few more examples on my mudlarking wanderings.