CHAPTER V.

GLAZED POTTERY.--MOORISH, PERSIAN, RHODIAN, ETC., ETC.

The Arabs in Spain.--Cordova, Granada, Seville.--Enamel and Lustres.--Hispano-Moresque.--The Alhambra.--Tiles.--Vase of the Alhambra.--Malaga.--Majorca and Maiolica.--Rhodian Pottery.--Damascus Pottery.--Persian and Arabic Pottery.--Persian Porcelain.--Persian and Arabic Tiles.

Before giving some particulars of the interesting examples of pottery which have come to us from the Arabs and the Moors of Spain, it may be well to devote a few moments to the people themselves.

I have thought it well to group under one head a number of their productions, because they are peculiar, and because they seem to have sprung from one centre, or to have grown up under a corresponding sense of the beautiful, so different from that of other peoples.

Beginning with the pottery of the Spanish Moors, now called _Hispano-Moresque_, and which is the latest, we run backward to the _Rhodian_, the _Arabic_, the _Damascene_, and the _Persian_. From what examples I have been able to see of these, they certainly show a strong family likeness in their colors, their designs, and their clays.

It is hardly to be supposed that this grew out of their religion, or that the fervid soul of Mohammed fired the souls of his followers with that striking and low-toned and intense and subtile harmony of blues, greens, and browns, which is so often seen on their tiles and dishes. It is more likely that, beginning somewhere, the Arabian potters carried with them wherever they went their colors and their secrets; and that what was desired in Persia, or Damascus, or Cairo, must be desired wherever the "followers of the faithful" were found; and thus they went to work to produce these various fictile wares which are now so much sought for.

One of the most curious, most interesting, and most picturesque episodes in modern history is that of the Moors in Spain.

From the year 712 to the time of the discovery of America, in 1492, these Moslems held possession of the finest parts of Spain, including the cities of Cordova, Granada, and Seville. Of these, Cordova and Seville are older than the Romans. In the first century they were fought over by Cæsar and Pompey, but were not destroyed. The shores of Spain were visited by the ships of Tyre, and afterward by the Greeks; but these came as traders, rather than as conquerors. The old inhabitants, the Iberians, were brave and determined; but they could not organize, could not resist the invading arms of Rome, which swept over the world under the leadership of some one able and daring leader. Then came in the Vandals and the Goths. They swarmed down upon Italy, and into Spain, where they became strong and great. As we read history, we see almost nothing but one long, fierce, destructive fight, and we wonder that there could have been any art, any learning, any kindness, in the world; for every man's hand was against every man, and the chief vocation of great men was to rob and enslave other men. So it has been, so it is now; the forms change, the fact remains. We have our feudal barons to-day. But how came the Moors--the Arabs, rather--in Spain? Briefly this may be answered:

The amazing, almost miraculous power with which _Mohammed the Promised_ had inspired the Arabian race led them forth to conquer and convert. They went east and they went west, until they stretched along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and reached the Pillars of Hercules.

Could the narrow strait stop their way? They passed over it like dry land, and spread their victorious bands over the southern part of the peninsula, and possessed themselves of the lovely lands of Andalusia, Estremadura, Castile, and even penetrated to the cold and savage mountains of Navarre.

What were these Moors? Were they savage beasts, cruel robbers?

They appear to have brought into Spain not only Art, but the arts, sciences, learning, literature. Under the strong and able rule of Abderrahman III. (912 to 961), agriculture, science, trade, and decent living, throve as they never yet had done in Spain. During the five or six centuries in which the Moors held the land, it is easy to believe that Spain enjoyed a greater measure of worldly prosperity than before or since. In this time Cordova, the seat of the caliphate, grew to have a population of a million souls; it had three hundred mosques and nine hundred baths. Its greatest mosque, begun in 786, shone with four thousand silver lamps, and its dome was raised aloft on twelve hundred slender pillars.

The city of Granada was built, and upon the sides of its mountain sprang into being the fairy fortress and palace of the _Alhambra_. Its halls, its courts, its galleries, its arabesques, its fretwork, its fountains, even in their ruin, tell us of the power of this singular people.

In Seville, too, the _Alcazar_ and the _Giralda_ even now bear beautiful witness to their art, their skill, their industry.

There seems little question now that the Moorish potters brought with them into Spain the arts which the Persian or Arabian potters knew, not only for the preparing the clays, but that they also had the secret for making the _stanniferous enamel_, or glaze, into which the use of tin enters. They also applied to the decoration of their wares certain _lustres_, which Demmin says were produced by the fumes of bismuth, of antimony, or of arsenic. It is not probable that gold was a component part of these lustres.

Just when the Moors went to work to make their tiles and their lustred dishes, we do not know. But as ornamental tiles--_azulejos_--were used to decorate their walls, we conclude that the production began almost at once. These tiles were not only used in bands or strips on the walls; they were also used as pavements, and the floors of the Alhambra were glittering with them, some few of which still remain there.

Mr. Ford's description of them, thus quoted by Marryat, says: "Moorish very fine, and most ancient; surface plain, painted and enameled blue; the elaborate designs in gold lustre. The inscription on the shield is the well-known motto of the Mussulman founders of the palace of Granada: 'There is no conqueror but God.' The date of its manufacture may be placed about 1300."

Our engraving of one of these tiles (Fig. 59) gives a good representation of the design, but it cannot, of course, express the color. No one can fail to see how far away it is from the commonplace and the ordinary geometric patterns into which the dull man invariably falls; no one can fail to be struck with the simple intricacy which interests, we cannot tell why.

Another remarkable piece of their work is _The Vase of the Alhambra_ (Fig. 60), one of the most beautiful and most interesting vases anywhere known. This is sometimes called "La Jarra," and is figured in Owen Jones's "Alhambra," where will be found much more that is worthy of attention. This is supposed to have been made about 1320. I take the description from Marryat's work: "It is of earthen-ware; the ground white, the ornaments either blue of two shades, or of that gold or copper lustre so often found in Spanish and Italian pottery. This beautiful specimen of Moorish workmanship, which is four feet three inches in height, was discovered, with another similar to it, beneath the pavement of the Alhambra, and is said to have been filled with gold. It was copied in 1842, at the manufactory of Sèvres, from drawings made in Spain by Dauzats." It has since been copied by Deck, of Paris.

_Malaga_ was probably the place where the best of the Moorish work was made, and there the manufacture continued for centuries. At Valencia faiences were afterward largely produced, as they are still.

The examples of Moorish dishes remaining are marked by a peculiar _lustre_, which I have mentioned, which is either a lighter or a darker yellow, and sometimes of a deep coppery color.

A very fine example of this golden lustred ware is in the collection of Mr. Wales, at Boston, through whose kindness I am enabled to present the accompanying illustration (Fig. 61). It is now, I think, hung in the loan collection of the Museum of Arts at Boston, with many other of his valuable and interesting pieces.

That any pieces of this work should yet be in existence may excite our surprise.

The struggle between the Christians and the Moslems for the possession of the government and the religion of Spain went on through the centuries. Yet through all these troubled centuries these Moors found time to build great cities, and to create those beautiful examples of their peculiar architecture which are so satisfactory even in ruin. They also did more to encourage learning and the arts than any other nation of Europe; so that their schools and their scholars became renowned the world over, and were flocked to by Christian students.

In due time internal dissensions weakened them; then they went to ruin, and at last were driven out of Spain by the combined Christians. Then it was that the bitterness of war was intensified with the hatreds of religion; and then it was that a war of destruction was waged, not only against the persons of the "vile Moslems," but against all their works; so that nothing should remain to tell the story of their hated supremacy and their hated religion. Then it was that the Moorish potters of Malaga and Valencia were slaughtered or expelled, and then, too, their handiwork went with them into wholesale destruction.

In this wreck and ruin, it is singular that the mosques, those finest monuments of the arts and the industry of the Moors, were spared.

These remain, and a few examples of their pottery, of which we have striven to give some idea, though faint.

One thing seems to be admitted on all hands, viz.: that to the Moors of Spain Europe owes either the invention or the introduction of siliceous or glass-glazed wares, and that from that date begins all improvements in fictile work; that directly from it came the potteries of the Balearic Islands, and that from Majorca came not only the names into Italy, but in all probability the potters or their secrets, which resulted in the production, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, of the wares now so famous under the name of _Majolica_, or, as it is now spelled, MAIOLICA, of which we shall have something to say further on.

RHODIAN POTTERY.--Pursuing this subject eastward, we find traces of a lustred pottery on the island of _Sicily_, believed to be the work of Arabic potters.

Still farther eastward, upon the island of Rhodes, have been found many plates and dishes, now classed as _Rhodian_, sometimes as _Persian_, and sometimes as _Damascus_ ware. The styles of this work, their colors and their designs, seem to group them together, and it is difficult to separate them in any consistent way.

The first I saw of these were hung on the walls of the house of Mr. Frederick Leighton, the distinguished artist of London. While following his art on the island of Rhodes, he had heard that some pottery of this sort was now and then to be found on the island; the pieces he saw were very bold and striking, and tradition there said that they were the work of Persian potters, who, as prisoners, had centuries before been placed on the island. Finding clay to their hands, they went to work at their trade, and, with little doubt, practised it diligently through a long time, and handed it down to their children.

Whatever was the truth of the tradition, a search among the poor people of the island unearthed many pieces of the ware, which Mr. Leighton brought with him to London. This was repeated on a second visit, until now this private collection is probably one of the best in England.

Upon his second return, Mr. Leighton told me he found in London, for sale, plates and dishes of the same character and coloring which were said to have been brought around from Persia; so that, whatever may have been the origin of this ware, whether Rhodes, Persia, or Damascus, the product was almost the same.

Mr. Fortnum, in his "Hand-Book upon Maiolica," says:

"The paste varies in quality more than in kind, being of a gray-white color and sandy consistence, analogous to that of the Persian wares. The decoration is more generally rich in color, the ground white, blue, turquoise, tobacco-color, and lilac, sometimes covered with scale-work, with panels of Oriental form or leafage, large sprays of flowers, particularly roses, tulips, hyacinths, carnations, etc., the colors used being a rich blue, turquoise, green, purple, yellow, red, black. The forms are elegant: large bowls on raised feet; flasks or bottles bulb-shaped with elongated necks; pear-shaped jugs with cylindrical necks and loop-handle; circular dishes or plates with deep centres, etc. An interesting example of the highest quality of this ware is in the writer's possession, and is described and figured in color in vol. xlii. of the 'Archæologia.' It is a hanging-lamp made for and obtained from the Mosque of Omar at Jerusalem, signed and dated June, 1549.

"Two leading varieties are known in collections: namely, _Damascus proper_; known by its evenness of surface and rich glaze with subdued but harmonious coloring, certain tones of which are peculiar to this variety; for example, a dull lilac or purple, replacing the embossed red so conspicuous on the Rhodian, and used against blue, which is of two or three shades, the turquoise being frequently placed against the darker tone; a sage green is also characteristic. The dishes of this variety usually have the outer edge shaped in alternating ogee.

"This kind is much more uncommon than the other, RHODIAN or LINDUS, to which the greater number of pieces known in collections as 'Persian ware' belong. It is to Mr. Salzmann that we owe the discovery of the remains of ancient furnaces at Lindus, in the island of Rhodes, from the old palaces of which he collected numerous examples. This variety, although extremely beautiful, is generally coarser than the former, and the decoration more marked and brilliant. A bright-red pigment, so thickly laid on as to stand out in relief upon the surface of the piece, is very characteristic and in many cases is a color of great beauty; the predominant decoration of the plates consists of two or three sprays of roses, pinks, hyacinths, and tulips, and leaves, sometimes tied together at the stem and spreading over the entire surface of the piece in graceful lines; the border frequently of black and blue scroll-work. Ships, birds, and animals, are also depicted; and a shield-of-arms occurs on some pieces."

A few of these striking Rhodian plates are to be seen in America; and I here engrave one (Fig. 62) from Mr. W. C. Prime's collection, which is an excellent example. It shows a group of flowers starting from a point, the central stalk being that of a purple hyacinth. This method of grouping was a favorite one with these painters. These plates vary in price in Europe from fifteen to seventy-five dollars each.

Of the DAMASCUS pottery little can be said, because little is known. From time to time plates and dishes are purchased there and brought to us, which possess the general character already described as Rhodian, but are thought to have a delicacy and fineness not found in that pottery. A very handsome example is in Mr. Wales's collection, which bears a little gilding, and which, perhaps, may be classed as of Damascus.

Of PERSIAN and ARABIC pottery it is impossible, in the vagueness existing with respect to it, to do more than make a few suggestions.

We cannot do better than to read what Mr. Fortnum has gathered with regard to this ware:

"We do not derive any information from M. de Rochchouart on the subject of the lustred wares, except in his description of the tiles of the Mosque of Natinz of the twelfth century; nor do we learn anything of that variety of creamy white pottery having the sides pierced through the paste, but filled with the translucent glaze, and which is believed to be the Gombr[=o]n ware of Horace Walpole's day. But he gives interesting information on the subject of the tiles used for decoration, of which the finest are those mentioned above; those of Ispahan and of the period of Shah Abbas being also admirable for their exquisite design.

"The Persian glazed pottery known to us may be divided into:

"_A._ Wares, generally highly baked, and sometimes semi-translucent. Paste, fine and rather thin, decorated with ruby, brown, and coppery lustre, on dark-blue and creamy-white ground.

"_B._ Wares, of fine paste, highly baked, semi-translucent, of creamy color and rich, clear glaze, running into tears beneath the piece of a pale sea-green tint. Its characteristic decoration consisting of holes pierced through the paste, and filled in with the transparent glaze: the raised centres, etc., are bordered with a chocolate brown or blue leafage, slightly used. This is supposed to be the Gombr[=o]n ware.

"_C._ Wares, frequently of fine paste, and highly baked to semi-transparency: the ground white; decoration of plants and animals, sometimes after the Chinese, in bright cobalt blue, the outlines frequently drawn in manganese; some pieces with reliefs and imitation Chinese marks also occur; this variety is perhaps more recent than the others."

This description may apply rather to a sort of semi or imperfect _porcelain_ of Persian manufacture, as to the reality of which there has been and is much doubt, rather than to the peculiar class of faience of which we have been writing.

As to the _porcelain_ or hard faience of PERSIA, here and there are to be met with singular examples, which, because of a peculiar style of painting, combined with a certain coarseness or imperfectness of paste, have usually been relegated to the less dexterous potters of Persia. That pottery has been made in Persia, far back in the dimness of the Dark Ages, there seems to be no doubt; just what it was remains a doubt; because even then a sort of commerce, probably by sea and land, existed with China, and thence came porcelains of various qualities and many designs. We are apt to believe that, until our day, there were few "cakes and ale"--little art, or only coarse fabrics. Whereas fine and admirable work of many sorts, and especially in porcelain and pottery, had reached perfection before our European or Western civilization began. Out of China came porcelain to Persia; out of Persia and Phoenicia came pottery to us.

Of the Persian porcelain, or hard pottery, a single example is to be seen in Mr. Avery's collection, now in the Museum of Art at New York. It was bought at the Vienna Exhibition from Prince _Ehtezad-es-Saltenet_, uncle to the Shah of Persia, and we may suppose it, therefore, to have about it the true flavor of genuineness. It is a bowl of rather coarse ware, approaching to the hardness, if not the translucency, of porcelain; it is painted with blue of a common color, and with a not very interesting design; and is valuable as an example of the probable work of Persian potters.

But there exist many pieces of pottery besides these, which have usually been called Persian because of their peculiarities of design and of coloring. Some of these approach closely to the work already designated as Rhodian or Damascene. In the upper plate of Fig. 62, from Mr. Prime's collection, is shown one of these, which the owner is inclined to believe may be Persian and not Rhodian. So also the painted faience egg (Fig. 62), obtained by him from a lamp in a mosque of the Holy Land. The face and the coloring do certainly impress one with a Persian faith, though it may not be easy to explain the reason why.

In my possession is a sweetmeat-pot covered with an "engobe" or "slip," upon which are boldly painted in colors flowers and leaves; these last are peculiar in shape, and are by some believed to be Persian work--I doubt it, but it is possible.

We have a few words to say of the Persian or Arabic TILES. These have been found inlaid upon the walls of mosques and palaces and tombs in Damascus, in Cairo, in Ispahan. As far back as the palmy days of Babylon and Assyria, these enameled or glazed bricks or tiles were used to decorate the walls of their buildings; and that is about all we know. These bricks remain; for, of all the works of man, the brick is seemingly imperishable.

It is also certain that upon some of these bricks or tiles is found a glaze or enamel made with the use of tin; so that what is now called _stanniferous_ enamel was known at that early day, and long before it was used in Italy by _Luca della Robbia_, who at one time was supposed to have invented it.

The example here given (Fig. 63) is a very beautiful plaque, made up of many pieces, and is remarkable for the splendor of its color, rather than for any perfectness of design. It is interesting, however, as showing the dresses of the cavaliers of the Persian court.

In the walls of Damascus, of Jerusalem, and of Cairo, these tiles were imbedded for ornamental and decorative purposes, and from them they have been gathered by those good people called "collectors." In Fig. 62 is an engraving of one in Mr. Prime's collection, which gives simply the lines, but wholly fails to give the magic and mystery of color which endues it with beauty. This cannot be described, nor can it be pictured; the combinations of blues are too subtile for the palette of the painter; they have been sublimated in the fiery heats of the furnace.

A few of these tiles are in possession of Mr. Prime and of Mr. Wales; and a very fine collection is now in the house of Mr. Leighton, of London, of which I have spoken. He has had them imbedded in the walls of his halls, which they tinge with their peculiar and pensive light.