- Title
- Tankard
- Date Made
- 12th or 13th century
- Medium
- Fritware, underglaze-painted
- Dimensions
- 7 1/8 x 5 in. (18.10 x 12.70 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.73.5.270
- Collecting Area
- Art of the Middle East: Islamic
- Curatorial Notes
In addition to its fineness, fritware gave potters the newfound ability to marshal line and color with precision. Glazes could now be painted directly onto the pale, quartz-rich fritted clay before firing, eliminating the need to cover a vessel in a layer of white slip, an expensive first step that sometimes caused designs to run in the kiln. Though deceptively simple, the decoration of this early fritware vessel exemplifies this revolutionary advancement in ceramics technology: the restrained clusters of parallel cobalt lines along the tankard’s surface accentuate its bulging body.
