Redware as a single word is a term for at least two types of pottery of the last few centuries, in Europe and North America. Red ware as two words is a term used for pottery, mostly by archaeologists, found in a very wide range of places. However, these distinct usages are not always adhered to, especially when referring to the many different types of pre-colonial red wares in the Americas, which may be called "redware".
In the great majority of cases the "red" concerned is the natural reddish-brown of the fired
clay
Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4).
Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...
, and the same sort of colour as in
terracotta
Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous.
In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta ...
(which most types of red ware could also be called) or red brick. The colour to which clay turns when fired varies considerably with its geological makeup and the conditions of firing, and as well as terracotta red, covers a wide range of blacks, browns, greys, whites and yellows.
Of the two "redware" types, both made between the 17th to 19th centuries (with modern revivals or imitations), the European was unglazed
stoneware
Stoneware is a rather broad term for pottery or other ceramics fired at a relatively high temperature. A modern technical definition is a vitreous or semi-vitreous ceramic made primarily from stoneware clay or non-refractory fire clay. Whether vi ...
, mostly for teapots, jugs and mugs, and moderately, sometimes very, expensive. The American redware was cheap earthenware, very often with a
ceramic glaze
Ceramic glaze is an impervious layer or coating of a vitreous substance which has been fused to a pottery body through firing. Glaze can serve to color, decorate or waterproof an item. Glazing renders earthenware vessels suitable for holding ...
, used for a wide variety of kitchen and dining functions, as well as objects such as
chamberpots.
Redware
European
In European contexts "redware" usually means an unglazed ("dry-bodied")
stoneware
Stoneware is a rather broad term for pottery or other ceramics fired at a relatively high temperature. A modern technical definition is a vitreous or semi-vitreous ceramic made primarily from stoneware clay or non-refractory fire clay. Whether vi ...
, typically used for serving or drinking drinks. The term is especially used for pottery from the 17th and 18th centuries, before
porcelain
Porcelain () is a ceramic material made by heating substances, generally including materials such as kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to other types of pottery, arises main ...
, whether imported from East Asia or made in Europe, became cheap enough to be used very widely. In this period red stoneware was used for vessels, especially teapots, jugs and mugs, which were relatively expensive and carefully made and decorated. Imported examples of Chinese
Yixing clay teapot
Yixing clay teapots (), also called Zisha teapot (), are made from Yixing clay. This traditional style commonly used to brew tea originated in China, dating back to the 15th century, and are made from clay produced near Yixing in the eastern ...
s, an unglazed stoneware type made from a special type of clay, provided the exemplars and were often copied with various degrees of closeness. Soon a European design vocabulary was used as well.
A
Delftware
Delftware or Delft pottery, also known as Delft Blue ( nl, Delfts blauw) or as delf,
is a general term now used for Dutch tin-glazed earthenware, a form of faience. Most of it is blue and white pottery, and the city of Delft in the Netherlands ...
manufacturer announced in 1678 that he was making "red teapots", of which no examples are known to survive. The Dutch
Elers brothers brought the style to
Staffordshire pottery
The Staffordshire Potteries is the industrial area encompassing the six towns Burslem, Fenton, Hanley, Longton, Stoke and Tunstall, which is now the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. North Staffordshire became a centre of ce ...
in the 1690s, after finding a suitable source of clay, and were widely imitated there. Some red stoneware by rival Dutch potters including
Arij de Milde from the years around 1700 does survive, closely copying Yixing pots in style.
Johann Friedrich Böttger was in contact with some of these and developed a rival "Böttger ware", a dark red stoneware first sold in 1710, and manufactured and imitated by others, all up to about 1740. It was Böttger's first commercial ware and a significant stage in his development of porcelain in Europe, which he was soon making at the
Meissen porcelain
Meissen porcelain or Meissen china was the first European hard-paste porcelain. Early experiments were done in 1708 by Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus. After his death that October, Johann Friedrich Böttger continued von Tschirnhaus's work an ...
factory.
Josiah Wedgwood
Josiah Wedgwood (12 July 1730 – 3 January 1795) was an English potter, entrepreneur and abolitionist. Founding the Wedgwood company in 1759, he developed improved pottery bodies by systematic experimentation, and was the leader in the indus ...
later refined the type, and gave the decoration a fashionable turn towards
Neoclassicism, with his "Rosso Antico" body. This was usually decorated with
sprigged reliefs in black, creating pleasing contrasts like those in his earlier
Jasperware
Jasperware, or jasper ware, is a type of pottery first developed by Josiah Wedgwood in the 1770s. Usually described as stoneware, it has an unglazed matte "biscuit" finish and is produced in a number of different colours, of which the most com ...
.
American
![Redware Slip-decorated dish MET DP335286](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a1/Redware_Slip-decorated_dish_MET_DP335286.jpg)
In American contexts "redware" usually means
earthenware
Earthenware is glazed or unglazed nonvitreous pottery that has normally been fired below . Basic earthenware, often called terracotta, absorbs liquids such as water. However, earthenware can be made impervious to liquids by coating it with a ce ...
with a reddish body, whether glazed or not. In fact it was very often given a white or other glaze, either
tin-glazed
Tin-glazing is the process of giving tin-glazed pottery items a ceramic glaze that is white, glossy and opaque, which is normally applied to red or buff earthenware. Tin-glaze is plain lead glaze with a small amount of tin oxide added.Caiger-Smith, ...
or
lead-glazed, though it is more usual to describe them as lead-glazed. Depending on the locality, this was the basic utilitarian pottery of the Colonial period of North America. It was often complemented by imported or
American stoneware for large vessels where the added strength was useful. The name distinguishes the type from various other earthenwares with white, grey or yellow colours to the fired body, depending on the particular clay used. Some redware was imported from England. Later, American stoneware in particular, and various types of modern wares, including porcelain, took over for many types of objects.
[Groover, 231-233; Turnbaugh]
Major museum collections concentrate on the larger dishes, platters and jugs that are glazed, often in yellowish tones, and painted with bold
folk art
Folk art covers all forms of visual art made in the context of folk culture. Definitions vary, but generally the objects have practical utility of some kind, rather than being exclusively decorative art, decorative. The makers of folk art a ...
designs, even well into the 19th century. But these special decorated pieces are rather untypical of the mass of
sherd
In archaeology, a sherd, or more precisely, potsherd, is commonly a historic or prehistoric fragment of pottery, although the term is occasionally used to refer to fragments of stone and glass vessels, as well.
Occasionally, a piece of broken p ...
s found by archaeologists excavating sites of the period. Many of these fancy pieces are dated, signed or marked with a stamp.
File:Tea Canister MET DP207182 (cropped).jpg, Tea caddy, with "Sally Smith 1769" in the painting. Bucks County, Wrightstown, Pennsylvania
Wrightstown is an unincorporated community in Wrightstown Township in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States. Wrightstown is located at the intersection of Pennsylvania Route 413
Pennsylvania Route 413 (PA 413) is a , north–south state ...
File:Plate MET DP207701 (cropped).jpg, Dish with sgraffito
''Sgraffito'' (; plural: ''sgraffiti'') is a technique either of wall decor, produced by applying layers of plaster tinted in contrasting colours to a moistened surface, or in pottery, by applying to an unfired ceramic body two successive laye ...
decoration, inscribed "1793 HR", perhaps for Heinrich Roth, a potter then active in Northampton County, Pennsylvania
Northampton County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 312,951. Its county seat is Easton. The county was formed in 1752 from parts of Bucks County. Its namesake was Northamptonshire, En ...
.
File:Redware Water Jar (cropped).jpg, Utilitarian glazed water jar
File:Dish MET DP207768 (cropped).jpg, Platter, 1790s, slip decoration, Norwalk, Connecticut
, image_map = Fairfield County Connecticut incorporated and unincorporated areas Norwalk highlighted.svg
, mapsize = 230px
, map_caption = Location in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Fairfield County and ...
Red ware
"Red ware" is widely used in archaeology to distinguish local types of red pottery from types with other colours found in the same region. Generally these are unglazed earthenware where the red colour is easily visible in complete pieces. Examples of types include:
Red Polished Ware, of which there are four main unrelated types, all ancient, from Egypt, India, Cyprus and Roman Europe; the
Black and red ware culture
Black and red ware (BRW) is a South Asian earthenware, associated with the neolithic phase, Harappa, Bronze Age India, Iron Age India, the megalithic and the early historical period. Although it is sometimes called an archaeological culture, the ...
of Bronze Age India (individual objects are either black or red); Roman "red gloss ware" or
Terra sigillata
Terra sigillata is a term with at least three distinct meanings: as a description of medieval medicinal earth; in archaeology, as a general term for some of the fine red Ancient Roman pottery with glossy surface slips made in specific areas of t ...
; Late Roman
African red slip ware
African red slip ware, also African Red Slip or ARS, is a category of '' terra sigillata'', or "fine" Ancient Roman pottery produced from the mid-1st century AD into the 7th century in the province of Africa Proconsularis, specifically that part ...
; Salado or
Roosevelt Red Ware
Roosevelt Red Ware, also known as Salado Red Ware and Salado Polychrome, is a late prehistoric pottery tradition found across large portions of Arizona and New Mexico. The tradition involves the combination of red, white, and black paint in varyin ...
, Arizona, c. 1280 to 1450 AD, and one form of Romano-British
Crambeck Ware
Crambeck Ware is a type of Romano-British ceramic produced in North Yorkshire primarily in the 4th Century AD.Monaghan, G. 1997.''Roman Pottery from York'' (Archaeology of York Series 16/8). York: York Archaeological Trust. pp903-906
Site
The C ...
.
File:Red polished ware jar MET 36.1.16.jpg, Egyptian "red polished ware" jar, circa 3650 –3300 BC, Predynastic, Naqada II
The Gerzeh culture, also called Naqada II, refers to the archaeological stage at Gerzeh (also Girza or Jirzah), a prehistoric Egyptian cemetery located along the west bank of the Nile. The necropolis is named after el-Girzeh, the nearby contem ...
File:Red Ware Situla-shaped Jar from Malqata MET 11.215.481-82.jpg, Egyptian "red ware" situla
Situla (plural ''situlae''), from the Latin word for bucket or pail, is the term in archaeology and art history for a variety of elaborate bucket-shaped vessels from the Iron Age to the Middle Ages, usually with a handle at the top. All types ma ...
-shaped jar, c 1390–1353 BC, New Kingdom, Dynasty 18, reign of Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III ( egy, jmn-ḥtp(.w), ''Amānəḥūtpū'' , "Amun is Satisfied"; Hellenized as Amenophis III), also known as Amenhotep the Magnificent or Amenhotep the Great, was the ninth pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty. According to different ...
File:Stand MET SF9618124b.jpg, Etruscan red ware stand, 700–650 BC
File:Roman pottery African Red Slip.jpg, African red slip ware
African red slip ware, also African Red Slip or ARS, is a category of '' terra sigillata'', or "fine" Ancient Roman pottery produced from the mid-1st century AD into the 7th century in the province of Africa Proconsularis, specifically that part ...
, made in Tunisia, AD 350-400
Notes
References
*Groover, Mark D., ''An Archaeological Study of Rural Capitalism and Material Life: The Gibbs Farmstead in Southern Appalachia, 1790-1920'', 2006, Springer Science & Business Media, , 9780306479175
google books*Osborne, Harold (ed), ''The Oxford Companion to the Decorative Arts'', 1975, OUP,
*Turnbaugh, Sarah Peabody, "17th and 18th Century Lead-Glazed Redwares in the Massachusetts Bay Colony", in ''Images of the Recent Past: Readings in Historical Archaeology'', ed. Charles E. Orser, 1996, Rowman Altamira, {{ISBN, 0761991425, 9780761991427
google books
Stoneware
American pottery