A child’s small dish with a black transfer print of the Great Exhibition of 1851 at the Crystal Palace. The plate has a faceted shoulder with 12 sections and a black painted line border near the rim. There is a very slight blue tint to the clear pearlware type glaze.
This unusual print has four figures in costume in the foreground who probably represent the continents of the world. The print is an exact match with ceramic kiln wasters that I excavated in Bristol in 1982. See the included photo of an ink drawing I did in 1982 using the sherds from the dig. The wasters were accurately dateable to the 1851 period of J.D. Pountney, and the very early years of the succeeding Pountney & Goldney period of the Bristol Pottery, Water Lane. My original notes from 1982 state that the print was found on both tankards and saucers.
These small dishes are often attributed to Swansea, and as there was a strong connection with the Bristol and Swansea potteries, it is therefore not surprising that there are many similarities between their wares. However the excavated evidence provides extremely strong evidence of a Bristol attribution. It took me over 30 years to locate a complete example that matched the wasters I dug, so I would suggest this is a very rare dish.
Pot ID: AP/927
Dimensions: 132 mm widest.
Net Weight (grams): 111
Date: c.1851
Condition Report:
Large crack from rim across foot (with small associated chip) and into the base where it forks. Plus another foot chip and a small shallow chip on upper rim. Some light yellowish staining.
