Figurine

Object Name:

Figurine

Object ID:

1980.047.11

Place of Origin:

Staffordshire, England

Date:

1800-1835

Description:

Figurine of a Greek or Roman woman. Creamware. Earthenware. Pearlware. Female figure, completely hollow, wearing a toga and sandals. Laurel wreath around her hair. Beside her is a pillar with an egg-shaped, classically-decorated urn. Woman is embracing the finial with both hands. Top and bottom of pillar edged with beading. Urn is fluted and it has acanthus leaves at the top and swags around the middle. Figure and pillar stand on a thin square base. Glaze has bluish tinge. Interior glazed.
Green pooling in the creases. Otherwise cream-colored throughout. Mark on bottom in black ink "F32 / OG". No other marks. Good condition. Crack at nape of woman's neck, under her right arm where the urn touches her body, and around base of urn which is seperating from woman's body and stand. Monir chipped places throughout.
Subject described by donor as "Charlotte at Tomb of Werther", Goethe's "The Sorrows of Werther", written in 1773. This subject was produced by Wedgwood as early as 1787. (See Wolfe Mankowitz, "Wedgwood", p. 268.)
The white glazed earthenware were sought by the gentry and middle classes who could not afford the unglazed biscuit porcelain figures and animals which were, in turn, substitutes for even costlier marble statuary. In the late 1830's began a long vogue for flat-backed figures, p. 189.
According to Ivor Noel-Hume, "Pearlware: Forgotten Milestone of English Ceramic History", The Magazine Antiques" (March 1969), p. 391, pearlware was first put on the market by Wedgwood in 1778.
Since the motif is a classically-dressed woman mourning at an urn was a popular subject beginning around the end of the eighteenth century, the subject may not be from Goethe's novel. (See similar subject, "Andromeche Mourning at the Tomb of Hector", illustrated in "English Earthenware Figures: Lake Collection of the Everson Museum", The Magazine Antiques [September 1970], p. 417.)

Material:

Ceramic
Earthenware - Cream ware
Earthenware - Pearlware

Dimensions:

H-9.125 W-3.5 D-3 inches

Provenance:

Part of a large collection of 18th- & 19th-century ceramics, given by their collector, Alma (Mrs. Harold G.) Duckworth (1899-2003).

Credit Line:

Gift of Alma Duckworth

People:

Duckworth, Alma (1899-2003)