In some of the earlier Rockingham ware the outlines of the flowers and butterflies were in transfer printing, and the colouring was added by hand.
The illustrations given on [plates 21], [27], [28] and [29], show the universality of the potter’s art, which may be traced through many beautiful examples differentiated by racial customs and material.
The beauty of form in the Greek vase ([plate 27]) was but the natural outcome of a fine earthenware in the hands of an artistic people, with traditions and architecture of the highest order. In Persian pottery, form is subservient to colour, blue, turquoise and white being used in charming combination, together with a frank yet decorative treatment of natural forms.
The Hispano-Moresque and Italian Maiolica ([plate 29]) are remarkable for the technical excellence of their white enamel, rich blue, yellow and orange, the iridescence of their gold and ruby lustre, and their high technical skill in painting.
English earthenware of the 17th and 18th centuries, though traditional, showed a remarkable diversity in treatment and conception. The picturesque platter of the Toft school, with its quaint enrichment of trailing lines and heraldic forms in coloured slip, the fine red stoneware of Elers, with its graceful enrichments in delicate relief, and the varied and beautiful jasper ware of Wedgwood mark a distinct phase of the potter’s art, and bear a tribute to the vitality and personality of the founders of the “Potteries.”
MAIOLICA. [Plate 29.]
