Image Not Available

Plate

Dateca. 1755

MediumWhite salt-glazed stoneware

DimensionsOH: 15/16"; OD: 9 7/16"

Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. William H. Murdoch Jr.

Object number1973-42

DescriptionPlate: "Queen shape" plate press-molded with a barley seed border pattern in six lobed panel reserves; no foot ring.
Label TextNumerous advertisements appeared during the third quarter of the eighteenth century for stoneware plates and dishes, but only a few used descriptive terms suggesting shapes or patterns. For instance, Henry Barnes of Boston offered “white Stone Dishes, scolloped Plates, . . . [and] blue and white spriged Stone scolloped Dishes, [and] Plates” in 1751. Plain scallop-edged plates are rare survivals today, but blue and white sprigged specimens, with or without shaped edges, are as of yet unknown. In 1758, Prussian and basket-worked plates and dishes were sold in Boston, and “new-fashion basket Plates and oblong Dishes” were available there in 1764.

Fortunately, such all-too-rare period descriptions are augmented by abundant archaeological evidence confirming a broad selection of patterns that range from plain, unadorned rims to gadroon, reel, and feathered edges; more complex borders of floral, vine, or moth motifs were also popular. Fifty-three plate patterns have been cataloged in white stoneware, of which twenty-nine have been found, thus far, at archaeological sites in Williamsburg.
InscribedNone
MarkingsNone
ProvenanceFormerly in the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Williams H. Murdoch, Jr., Brielle, NJ.

Exhibition(s)