When people buy pottery they usually do it in order to use it as crockery or as an ornament. Being a product of artistic expression clayware can have a symbolic meaning as well. It can be inextricably linked with a certain country, town or region, which is visibly impressed on its surface. As a result, the skill of making beautiful things from clay can be connected with national identity.
Irish Pottery
The first examples of Irish pottery can be traced back to the Neolithic period. These were rude and rudimentary examples of crockery. Some of the earliest extant specimens of Irish pottery, vessels for food or cinerary urns, come from the Bronze age. They have been found mostly in the Irish crannogs. Irish medieval cathedrals and monasteries contain encaustic tiles which might have been made in Ireland. A few potteries cropped up in Ireland in the eighteenth century. Potteries were established in Belfast, Wexford, Dublin, Rostrevor in County Down, Limerick, Youghal, Cork, Waterford and Newry. Many of them produced coarse wares and, in general, most of them were short-lived endeavors that did not earn too much recognition. One exception was World’s End Pottery, a company established in the 1730s in Dublin by John Chambers. The company was acquired later on by Captain Henry Delamain, who ran it successfully until his death. He was able to develop his pottery thanks to the fi nancial support from the Dublin Society and the Irish House of Commons. Delamain spent the money to perfect his coal kilns used to fi re and glaze earthenware so that coal did not discolor the wares. After his death the company was run by his wife and later on by his brother. In the late 1760s it was taken over by the workers of the pottery; however, it ceased to exist in the 1770s (Dudley Westropp, Delamain, 1914-1916.
| dr Paweł Hamera |
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 Anglista, amerykanista, doktor nauk humanistycznych w zakresie historii; specjalizuje się w historii i kulturze Wysp Brytyjskich oraz Stanów Zjednoczonych; asystent w Instytucie Neofilologii Uniwersytetu Pedagogicznego im. KEN w Krakowie. |
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| SUMMARY |
| Throughout the nineteenth century it was oftentimes mentioned by British politicians or the British press that Ireland should utilize its natural resources in order to improve its condition. In the 1850s the discovery of feldspar and kaolin in County Fermanagh in the north-western part of Ireland ushered in the pottery industry on the Emerald Isle. The Belleek pottery allowed the Irish to feel proud. What is more, the clayware from Belleek found patrons in Queen Victoria and her son, who bought some specimens and, thus, popularized it in Great Britain. On the heels of the spectacular success of the Belleek came Fredrick Vodrey who not only produced excellent pottery but by employing Celtic motifs became a part of the Gaelic Revival, which helped to the Irish to bolster their national identity and mitigate the infl uence of Anglo-Saxon culture. The article shows what role the Belleek and Vodrian pottery played in Ireland in the nineteenth century when the Irish where trying to gain independence. |
| STRESZCZENIE Duma, ceramika i nacjonalizm w XIX-wiecznej Irlandii |
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W XIX wieku zarówno Brytyjscy politycy, jak i brytyjska prasa często wspominali o tym, że aby uzdrowić swoją sytuację Irlandia powinna wykorzystać bogactwa naturalne. Odkrycie skalenia i kaolinu w latach 50. XIX w. w hrabstwie Fermanagh w północno-zachodniej części Irlandii zapoczątkowało przemysł ceramiczny na Szmaragdowej Wyspie. Ceramika Belleek pozwoliła Irlandczykom poczuć dumę. Co więcej, ceramika z Belleek miała za patronów królową Wiktorię i jej syna, którzy kupili pochodzące stamtąd produkty i tym samym uczynili je popularnymi w Wielkiej Brytanii. Zaraz po spektakularnym sukcesie ceramiki Belleek nadszedł czas na Fryderyka Vodrey, który nie tylko wytwarzał doskonałą ceramikę, ale wykorzystując celtyckie motywy odegrał |
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Pełna treść artykułu jest dostępna w papierowym wydaniu pisma 5/2014. Zapraszamy do składania zamówień na prenumeratę i numery archiwalne. |
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