SC - feastware question
Dottie Elliott
difirenze at usa.net
Wed Oct 14 22:30:49 PDT 1998
>I just
>got through looking at a site that has beautiful late anglo-saxon
>reproduction
>pottery on it.
If this is a web site, I would love to see the address.
As someone who has been studying medieval pottery (and learning to make
pottery) for a while now I will try to answer this. First of all, our
knowledge of the middle ages is based on what archeologist have found,
and drawings, paintings and writings or the period. Its my opinon that
its impossible to tell from an illuminated manuscript or painting whether
an item is metal, pottery or wood. Plates in England aren't found until
the late fifteen hundreds and those were square and made of wood. Now,
they did have silver plates before that. It was an ostentatious show of
wealth and was used as such. Often such plates (and even the more
beautiful pottery) was displayed during feasts rather than used as
another show of wealth (you have so much you don't need to use it all).
Most of the pottery that survives from England are pots, jugs, pitchers,
pans and later cups, bowls and so on. Pottery in England in the 10th &
11th centuries was mostly rather simple (well compared to Italy). It was
crudely made and decorated possibly not all. Pottery was mostly very
functional. Cups of the time are mostly wood (bowls) or metal. Things got
better as time went on. I have read that the pottery industry in England
collapse when Rome withdrew and that explains why their pottery was crude
early on. Certainly, it was not nearly as finished looking nor as highly
decorated as Italy's pottery.
Also, let me say that of the cups, bowls and plates I am making, plates
are the hardest. You must be careful to leave enough clay for the bottom
to be able to use the item but if you leave too much it will warp on
drying and be too heavy. My teacher agress that they are one of the
harder items to make.
Its my personal opinion that poorer folks used simple wood bowls in their
own homes because they would have been eating bread (not using it as a
plate and throwing/giving it away). This was something they could make
themselves as well. Wood doesn't break as easily as pottery either.
Please also remember that at feasts folks shared food containers. How
many people you might share with depended on your social rank. The type
of bread and amount and type of food was dictated by this as well. The
trencher was a place to put your portion that you removed from a communal
bowl. There is a whole realm of ettiquette on how to share food (like its
bad manners to eat the trencher), share cups, etc. Its my opinion that
when serving large groups of people, bread trenchers were the only way to
give that many folks their own 'plate'.
I started learning about pottery with the single intent of making period
looking items for displaying my food in A&S contests. I was sadly
disappointed to find that for England and France, bread trenchers are
what I must use. For Italy, at least, I can do plates & bowls.
Clarissa
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