Fig. 63.—Persian Plaque.
In the walls of Damascus, of Jerusalem, and of Cairo, these tiles were imbedded for ornamental and decorative purposes, and from them they have been gathered by those good people called “collectors.” In Fig. 62 is an engraving of one in Mr. Prime’s collection, which gives simply the lines, but wholly fails to give the magic and mystery of color which endues it with beauty. This cannot be described, nor can it be pictured; the combinations of blues are too subtile for the palette of the painter; they have been sublimated in the fiery heats of the furnace.
A few of these tiles are in possession of Mr. Prime and of Mr. Wales; and a very fine collection is now in the house of Mr. Leighton, of London, of which I have spoken. He has had them imbedded in the walls of his halls, which they tinge with their peculiar and pensive light.
CHAPTER VI.
GLAZED POTTERY.—ITALIAN MAIOLICAS.
The Word Maiolica, or Majolica.—Italian Renaissance.—The Dark Ages.—The Crusades.—The Mezza-Maiolica.—The True Maiolica.—Luca della Robbia.—Urbino.—Xanto and Fontana.—Raffaelesque Ware.—Mr. Fortnum.—Prices to-day.—Gubbio.—Maestro Giorgio.—The Lustres.—Castel-Durante.—Faenza.—The Sgraffito.—Forli, Venice, Castelli, etc.—Castellani.—Maiolicas at the Centennial.
THE term Maiolica, or Majolica, as has been often explained, came from the island of Majorca, whence came to Italy, in the twelfth century, some of those peculiar potteries already described under the name of Hispano-Moresque.
The Balearic Islands, lying in such convenient proximity to the mainland, were then possessed by the active and enterprising Moors—that most daring and doing race, who had planted the standard of the Prophet in Southern Europe. From these convenient islands they could organize pleasant surprises upon the coasts of Italy, and gratify themselves with much plunder. While human nature can bear and does bear much marauding, there comes a time when endurance ceases to be a virtue, and then—war ensues. Such a time had come in the twelfth century, when the Pisans, and their friends along the Italian coasts, determined to plunder, rather than be plundered; and then they pounced upon the hated Moors of the islands, and turned the tables upon them. It is believed that, among the spoils carried away to Italy, were many pieces of the peculiar wares made by the Moors in these islands as well as in Spain. That these examples, and some of the potters themselves, were carried away to the Italian coast, is most likely; and that the Italians, always a people with quick sensibilities, and a ready perception of the beautiful, if not of the good or the true, at once saw that here was a manufacture ready to their hands, which combined use and beauty, as their own did not. At any rate, it was during the most vivid period of the Italian Renaissance (1350 to 1600) that the production of the highly-decorated fictile work, known as Maiolica, sprang up, culminated, and went to decay.