Both a trade commodity and a container for shipping traded goods, pottery has been crucial to long-distance trade for millennia. Shown here is a pottery market in Veracruz, Mexico, in the early twentieth century. (Library of Congress)
The manufacture of containers or artworks from clay heated to at least 932o Fahrenheit.
Pottery is one of the oldest crafts performed by humans to shape clay into containers or artistic expressions. Ancient cultures shaped idols, bowls, and other decorative forms of pottery, which they often worshipped. Common themes expressed in this form of art were fertility and the hearth. Shards of pottery yield valuable information to archaeologists, who can analyze the clay and de termine where it came from and the shape of the pottery, which often indicates the period in which it was made. People throughout Europe, China, the Americas, Africa, and the Middle East used pottery, and some intact pieces as well as many fragments still remain from these areas.
Pottery is made by one of two methods. A long cord of clay in its pliable state is smoothed by hand, or clay is placed on a potter’s wheel and shaped by hand as the wheel turns. Potter’s wheels date to before 4000 B.C.E. in ancient Egypt. Decorations were either carved into the pottery or painted on. The object was then placed in a kiln, where the clay was heated and hardened. The lowest level of heat (932o Fahrenheit) is used to produce porous-body pottery, with the temperature increased for stoneware and increased still higher to produce porcelain.
Throughout the ancient world, pottery was used primarily as a vessel for holding water, oil, or wine. Since oil and wine were shipped around the Mediterranean, archaeologists can determine where the trade originated by the shape and style of the pottery. Minoan and Mycenaean pottery was distinguished by its curvilinear, painted decoration. Greek vases used from 800 to 300 B.C.E. were distinguished by the red or black Attic decorations and by their symmetrical shape. Greeks also made multicolor pottery, but this type of vessel, used for burials, was not placed in the kiln, so the paint could be easily smeared. During Roman times, much of the pottery shipped throughout the Mediterranean was produced in North Africa. That trend continued throughout the region until the beginning of the ninth century, when Arab merchants brought Chinese porcelain for trade along the silk road.
The Chinese began manufacturing porcelain around 500 B.C.E., but it was not until the Yuan and the Ming dynasties that use of the product became widespread. Initially, porcelain was produced for the imperial family, with all items processed in one specific kiln. The rest of the population used porcelain for primarily utilitarian purposes. Between 581 and 906 C.E., the Chinese began manufacturing porcelain for export. Trade in porcelain was soon established with Korea and Japan. The Muslim world purchased porcelain from China but never discovered the secret of manufacturing it. The objects shipped to India and the Middle East had a distinct design and were different from the porcelain sold in China. Trade in Chinese porcelain reached its peak during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as the European powers traded directly with the Far East. Porcelain was highly prized in Europe, and only the wealthiest people could afford this delicate form of pottery. The Portuguese and then the Dutch were the first to carry Chinese porcelain directly to Europe. By 1604, Dutch ships were carrying more than 10,000 pieces of porcelain. Royalty such as Henry IV of France and James I of England highly prized Chinese porcelain. During the first half of the seventeenth century, more than half a million pieces of porcelain were shipped from China to Europe. That figure continued to grow during the first half of the eighteenth century, when approximately 150,000 pieces of porcelain were unloaded in Europe in a single day.
Both a trade commodity and a container for shipping traded goods, pottery has been crucial to long-distance trade for millennia. Shown here is a pottery market in Veracruz, Mexico, in the early twentieth century. (Library of Congress)
The introduction in the world market of Chinese pottery helped increase demand for the objects. The superior quality of porcelain also helped to increase its price. Collectors look for Chinese pottery with marks on the base, indicating that the item was made for the domestic market and was therefore was rarer than those manufactured for export. Items made for export were not marked on the base.
Eventually, porcelain was manufactured in the West, but not at the quality of the original Chinese pieces. Fine china was manufactured in England and the United States by the late 1700s. A large pottery center in England grew around the town of Stoke-on-Trent, where companies such as Wedgwood, Spode, Adams, Minton, Mason, Aynsley, and Doulton produced dinnerware.
Although pottery has been replaced by glass or plastic vessels as the primary container for liquid or other goods, pottery is still produced and sold around the world. More than 150 countries import and export pottery. Mass production has reduced the price so it is no longer purely a luxury item. A segment of the pottery industry continues to produce handmade pieces that are higher in quality and price.
Cynthia Clark Northrup
See also: Archaeology; Olives; Wine.
Cook, Robert Manuel. Greek Painted Pottery. London: Methuen, 1966.
Cooper, Emmanuel. Ten Thousand Years of Pottery. London: British Museum, 2000.
Macintosh, Duncan. Chinese Blue and White Porcelain. Woodbridge, UK: Antique Collectors’ Club, 1994.