Art Collections Online

This bowl is one of a distinctive group of white salt-glazed stoneware tea and coffee wares, all early examples of the use of slip-casting in plaster moulds by the Staffordshire pottery industry. In this early period, the moulds appear to have been cut by inexperienced block-cutters, resulting in designs which appear quite crude. The ten panels on this bowl are a mixture of heraldry, mythological or allegorical subjects, and scenes from daily life: 1) a crowned double-headed eagle; 2) three women drinking tea; 3) a naked figure carrying a globe on his shoulder; 4) a cloaked man with a sword and grapes and a woman in Tudor dress; 5) a fox, a goose and a medallion of a bearded head; 6) a trumpeting cherub astride a lion with a swimming swan below; 7) a robed man and woman in crown-like caps; 8) a reclining nude woman and a unicorn below; 9) a man with bow and staff walking with two dogs; 10) a shield (a chevron between three fleur-de-lis), a running deer and a bird.