EarlyAmericanCeramics.com: Probably an 18th Century Red Earthenware Molasses Jar Recently Discovered in Southern Maine

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

Probably an 18th Century Red Earthenware Molasses Jar Recently Discovered in Southern Maine

I have recently written about a small group of eighteenth century thick rimmed red earthenware mollases jars, which have been found in various contexts of ownership in the York, Maine and Portsmouth, New Hampshire areas. Most of these objects are owned today by Old York Museums in Maine; although, I also wrote about a jar that was recently discovered in a home in Cape Ann in Massachusetts.

According to an article written by Barbara H. Magid for the 2005 edition of 'Ceramics in America,' titled, 'Sugar Refining Pottery from Alexandria and Baltimore,' "From at least the Middle Ages until the nineteenth century the sugar refining industry used two unique forms of industrial pottery: thick rimmed syrup jars (pots) and conical sugar molds. These distinctive forms have been found at archaeological sites in Cyprus, England (Southampton, Exeter, York and Bristol), France (Sadirac, Rouen and Bourdeaux), the West Indies, Faneuil Hall in Boston, the Lambert-Douglas Plantation site in Trenton, New Jersey, and the Metropolitan Detention Center site in Philadelphia. They were also used for nineteenth century sugar refineries in Alexandria, Virginia and Baltimore, Maryland."

These type of jars are also often found along the Maine seacoast, which seems to suggest an import system occurred in the eighteenth and possibly nineteenth century. Most of the thick rimmed jars found in Maine are also inscribed with a similar mark, which includes those jars owned by the Old York Museums.

Thanks to Ryan Beckman, who produces maple sugar at Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts each March, I have learned that the marks on these jars were used as a grading process, "A+, AA, B, BB, C. etc."

Nonetheless, this is a (later painted) red earthenware molasses jar that I recently discovered in southern Maine, which has since been traded to a collector of such material in Maine. The form and mark on this jar match examples that are owned by Old York Museums, as well as another jar that I have pictured below, which was also discovered in Maine.

Note: Here is the link to the article that I posted this past summer about a related jar that is owned today by Old York Museums in Maine.

Molasses Jar Recently Discovered in Maine