Early American Handled Redware Jar

I recently brought what I believe to be an American eighteenth-century redware jar from my personal collection, into the Boston Archaeology Department in West Roxbury, Massachuetts. I wanted to compare glazes of the redware artifacts from the Charlestown, Massachusetts collection to the interior of my jar. The black streaking metalic-like glaze on the exterior is seen throughout the Charlestown remains and the style is not exclusive to any one area or potter. This metallic-type glaze is seen elsewhere including eighteenth-century Essex County, Massachusetts, a few maritime colonial cities, parts of New York and parts of Pennsylvania. The metallic-type glaze is not exclusive to the eighteenth-century either. There are many nineteenth-century examples. For one to attribute an example only through this glaze idea is difficult to do and more-often-than-not would be left open for skepticism. The information that lead to the attribution would have to be solid. However, the interior glaze is extremely unique and as I far as I can remember - I have never seen such a glaze before. It consists of a streaking caramel and brown glaze that quickly turns into a freckled blue and green glaze with peach halos that covers the majority of the interior.

These are the results of my comparative research.

Early American Redware Jar with Charlestown, Ma Artifact

I am not going to release any more information at this time. It's up to your eyes if you think the glazes conform with one another. I will tell you the interior glazes are some-what similar and the exteriors of each do match accordingly as previously described. I am open to any suggestions at this point. I will tell you there is much more to the story and background of both the jar and the artifact that I am not ready to publicly deliver or acknowledge.

A similar redware jar is seen in the Little Compton, Rhode Island Historical Society's collection.

Photo Courtesy: Little Compton, RI Historical Society

The stoneware jar below was made in Charlestown around the turn of the nineteenth-century by Frederick Carpenter. It is similar in form to the aforementioned redware jar. I have hinted at this before and I will open the idea up again for discussion. Did the latter stoneware potters of Charlestown try to mimic the work of the town's early redware potters - much like those redware potters copied the styles of the colonial imported wares? That's all up for discussion and interpretation at this point. It's all a part of my ongoing research.

I am making no reference to the redware jar being a Charlestown product at this time. 

Likely Frederick Carpenter Stoneware Jar - Charlestown, Ma

Late 18th or Early 19th Century
Stamped "Boston" and Number 3

Photo Courtesy: Skinner, Inc. - Boston

I will admit that I am fascinated by the ceramic stories and visuals that are emerging from Colonial Charlestown - and in-time, I feel it is going tell a wonderful story.

More research to come...