The love of china-ware still continues to be a mania amongst certain
classes in this country. In the houses chiefly of the ‘upper ten,’ we
see scattered in lavish profusion little Dresden figures, shepherds and
shepherdesses, sweet, fresh, smiling, fantastic little loves, leaning
on impossible crooks, or ogling us from under trees whose bowery
greenery embodies all that is idyllic in crockery. Wonderful little
old tea-cups, without handles, transparent as an egg-shell, with no
colouring to speak of, faded, washed-out looking, are proudly pointed
to as almost priceless. From these our great-great-grandmothers, in
all the glories of hoops and furbelows, are said to have drunk their
hyson and bohea in their great wainscoted and tapestried rooms,
discoursing as they sipped the fragrant nectar, much as we their
great-great-granddaughters do still, over our afternoon tea; for the
world changes, but the human heart does not. All manner of vanities go
the round; trivialities of dress or gossip; much tattling about the
mote in our neighbour’s eye, and a careful avoiding, with commendable
modesty, any reference even the most remote to the beam in our own.
These pale transparent cups going their oft-repeated rounds may have
sown in their day the seeds of many a pathetic commonplace tragedy or
comedy, disseminating, as they circulated around the board, harmony and
peace, or dissension and distrust.
Your true china collector has undoubtedly in him something of the
antiquarian Dryasdust spirit, which loves to excavate and unearth the
buried treasures of the past; in his case, however, it is gracefully
blended with and overlaid by an instinctive fondness for the tender,
lovely, fragile object of his regard. He knows, for he has often
anxiously weighed it, how frail it is. Every time he looks at it he
remembers the tumult of conflicting emotions with which, once secured,
he packed it up with his own hands, and the fears for its ultimate
safety which tempered the ecstatic pride of his triumph in the bargain
which he had just struck.
To the china-hunter, every object in his cabinet or on his brackets is
a trophy. That quaint old enamelled _tazza_ of Lucca della Robbia’s,
he bought in Rome; and as he gazes at it he thinks not so much of
the astute Jew dealer, for whom, as he flatters himself, his own
knowingness was fully a match, but of a long-forgotten holiday, with
its bright days of sunshine, and the lengthening purple shadows of
night deepening over the skies, and the grapes in ripe clusters on the
wall. How well he remembers their flavour still, and the hand that
plucked them for the stranger, and the eyes that looked into his! What
was her name? He has forgotten it. What her fate? He has never known.
A most prosaic ending, truly, to a vanished romance. But her charming
grace and beauty unforgotten, blend still in his memory like a sweet
rhythmical chant, and beautify with a glory not altogether its own this
rare old cup of Lucca della Robbia’s.
With a sigh he turns from it to contemplate this old plate of
mezza-majolica. Opal-hued, iridescent, it darts at him as he gazes upon
it subtle flashes of blue and yellow and ruby-hued flame, rejoicing
his soul with a deep unalterable conviction that it at least is real.
He acquired it in Urbino, many, many years after he became the happy
possessor of the Lucca della Robbia cup. He paid a full price for it
too; but although a close man, he does not, and has never regretted the
imprudence. At the sight of that beautiful plate, which he is pleased
to call unique, his charmed heart melts away into softness, and his
purse-strings begin to relax of their own accord. It moves his spleen
to see careless visitors pass it by, as they sometimes do, to gaze at
the soft beauty of that bright yellow-robed maiden, with dove upon her
hand, who hovers self-forgetful upon the very verge of a pea-green
china sea. The poor old quaint plate of mezza-majolica, gleaming there
like a veritable jewel, is a treasure he jealously guards, and of its
history we would say a few words.
The Italian enamelled earthenware which became famous under the name of
Majolica, was first produced in 1300 in a town in the duchy of Urbino,
which was under the feudal sway of the Malatestas, who were lords of
Pesaro. Vessels of red clay such as had been long in use were covered
with a thin coating of white earth obtained from the neighbourhood of
Siena, and upon this ground different coloured patterns were traced.
The vessels were then partly baked and covered with lead-glaze, after
which they received a final firing. This delineation of coloured
patterns upon an opaque white substance was the humble germ out of
which the splendid many-hued majolica ware grew.
The colours employed were usually yellow, green, blue, and black; and
the soft lead glaze, which was easily affected by external influences,
imparted to the pottery that metallic iridescent lustre which is the
special characteristic of majolica. To the Spanish Moors, this art
was also well known; and some of their beautiful masterpieces finding
their way into Italy, acted as a fillip to the infant art, which long
remained swathed in rude and ungraceful swaddling-bands. While it was
in this transition state, a new tin glaze was discovered, and applied
to terra-cotta bas-reliefs by the famous Lucca della Robbia, and the
lordship of Pesaro was sold to the house of Sforza. The new feudal
superiors took an extreme interest in the potteries, and granted such
special privileges to the manufacturers, that in a short time they
succeeded in making Pesaro famous for the production of majolica.
Early specimens of the ware manufactured here are generally adorned
with Moorish arabesques and coats of arms. Heads of saints are also a
favourite study, and so are heathen goddesses; while heads of the popes
and Dukes of Urbino abound, the name being affixed, to prevent all
mistake as to the portrait.
In the pottery of the Pesaro manufactory, the outlines of the subjects
are traced in black or blue, and are in general correctly drawn; but
the figures are flat and hard, without a vestige of the breadth and
freedom which give such admirable life and vigour to the etchings on
the Greek vases; all faults in design or execution being atoned for
by the marvellous beauty and finish of the glaze, whose iridescent
splendour has been equalled but never surpassed by later artists. The
most beautiful specimens of this ware are due to the genius of an
obscure artist, whose very name has been forgotten, who flourished in
Pesaro about 1480. The dishes he made were large and thick, and were
intended not so much for use as for display; as is shewn by holes in
a projection behind, through which strings were passed in order to
suspend them from the wall. The colours he used were blue and yellow,
and they shone with a rare and matchless mother-of-pearl splendour.
At the end of the fifteenth century tin enamel had come into general
use, and the potteries of the duchy of Urbino had begun to manufacture
a finer majolica ware. The art may be said to have reached its most
palmy period. The finest qualities of the old mezza-majolica were
retained in the new manufacture, and far greater artistic skill was
displayed in the painting and ornamentation. The town of Gubbio
acquired a world-wide fame by the beauty of its lustrous majolica;
and in the year 1485, Georgio Andreoli, a gentleman of Pavia, was
attracted to it. He was a painter and sculptor by profession; and
his majolica plates, glowing like jewels with the richest and most
brilliant colours, are still famous. He excelled in the use of ruby
red and golden yellow, and his ware is generally encircled by a
brilliant flame-coloured border. He delights also in the picturesque
effect produced by gold arabesques on a ground of vivid blue. His
period of greatest activity was from 1486 to 1537. To china-fanciers
he is known as the famous Maestro Georgio of Gubbio, and his works
now command almost incredible prices. He is charged with having made
a secret of his metallic lustre, and with having travelled about the
country selling his recipes to the highest bidder; but for this charge
there is no good ground. His brothers and his son worked along with
him, and they had many assistants, to whom all the processes of the
manufacture were known. In the city of Urbino, where Raphael was born,
the manufacture of majolica ware was carried on with great spirit and
success. Among the foremost of the ceramic artists of Urbino was a
certain Orazio Fontana. His designs, which are characterised by great
freedom and breadth of style, and truth and fidelity of drawing,
are likewise brilliantly coloured and admirably glazed. One of his
masterpieces, a magnificent cup, in the possession of Baron Rothschild,
has his name inscribed upon it; a frequent practice with the great
Italian potters.
All over the duchy of Urbino, potteries of this ware flourished at
Gubbio, at Pesaro, at Urbino, and at Castel Durante. From these
workshops potters travelled with their secrets to other parts of
Italy and also to Flanders. The majolica of Castel Durante is very
beautifully finished; and one of its principal manufacturers, Piccolo
Passo, wrote a treatise upon the art of making and decorating majolica.
Faenza, which has given its name in France to all soft pottery, also
produced much beautiful majolica ware. The Faenza majolica has, like
that of Urbino, a rich marzacotta glaze, and some of the more ancient
specimens are enamelled in berettino, a pale-blue tint. The later
Faenza majolica is in style very like that of Urbino; decorative and
embossed embellishments are laid aside, and pictorial designs are
generally used.
Such is a brief sketch of an art for which Raphael and Marc Antonio did
not disdain to furnish compositions, and whose masterpieces not only
found ready access into palaces, but were presented to churches and
hung up in cathedrals during the middle ages as votive offerings to
saints.