EarlyAmericanCeramics.com: A Beautiful Red Earthenware Pot Discovered in an Antique Shop in Northwood, New Hampshire Today

Saturday, May 23, 2015

A Beautiful Red Earthenware Pot Discovered in an Antique Shop in Northwood, New Hampshire Today

Earlier today, my father and I went out picking in New Hampshire in search of a proper spigot and a stoneware cover that would complete a stoneware water cooler that he purchased for my Mom for Mother's Day a few weeks ago. We began with a few shops on the New Hampshire seacoast before we made our way west to some shops in Central New Hampshire, which included the old-time 'Antique Alley' on Route 4. During the trip, I handled - and, examined a number of examples of utilitarian pottery; however, I didn't find anything that I had to have - until, I found a large slip decorated English-made red earthenware pot in a shop in Northwood, New Hampshire called, 'Coveway Antiques.'

Antique Shop in Central NH

Coveway Antiques - Northwood, NH

The man, who manages the shop told me the pot was recently found locally; he said it just came into the store. I knew immediately that it was made by a country potter in England in either the nineteenth or early-twentieth-century. Written in slip on the front of pot is the word, 'BREAD' - just above that is some beautifully executed comb decoration.

Based on the word that is written prominently on this pot - I assume that this jar was used for rising dough that was later used to make bread. Certainly, there was also a matching cover that originally accompanied this pot.

According to a book written by Andrew McGarva, 'Country Pottery: Traditional Earthenware of Britain,' "Only by studying the pots from a particular region of individual pottery can one recognize the variations in style, color, form and texture specific to them. The pots can sometimes be found in local museums or near their place of origin in auction sales, junk shops and, increasingly, in antique shops.

Britain has a hidden treasure, a vernacular tradition of pottery for home, farm and garden. If we take the term 'country' to distinguish these wares from the alternative urban industrial wares, this also provides us with the time-span of our story; from the beginning of the (English) industrial revolution in the mid-eighteenth century up to the Second World War (when almost all of the country potters had disappeared in England). These pots are artifacts from a way of life which no longer exists (today)."

Personally, I believe this large pot dates from the late-1800's, but there are probably arguments that could be had that may suggest it dates a little earlier or a little later. I also believe that it was possibly made by the potters, who were employed in either Buckley, (Wales) England, Yorkshire, England - or, at the least, Northern England. None-the-less, I feel it was a very-good find today!