A specimen of Spanish lustred ware more celebrated even than Fortuny's plaque is the “vase of the Alhambra” (Plate lix.), which rests to-day in a corner of the Sala de las Dos Hermanas. The history of this mighty jar is interesting. Popular superstition affirms it to have been discovered, filled to the brim with gold, by the Marquis of Mondejar, first of the Christian governors of the fortress of Granada. Exposed for many years to every stress of weather and to every mutilation at the hands of passers-by, it stood, in company with other vases of enormous size, upon a rampart which is now the garden terrace known as the Adarves. Several of the older travellers have described these vessels or alluded to them. Marmol wrote of them as far back as the sixteenth century, while the journal of Bertaut de Rouen contains the following notice;—“Sur la première terrasse par où l'on entre, et d'où l'on a de la peine à regarder en bas sans estre ébloüy, il y a deux fontaines jaillissantes, et tout du long des murs du chasteau, des espaliers d'orangers et de grenadiers, avec de grands vases de terre peinte, aussi belle que la porcelaine, où il n'y avoit pour lors, sinon quelques fleurs en quelques-uns: mais où l'on dit que le Marquis de Mondejar trouva quantité d'or que les Mores avaient caché dans la terre, quand il y fût estably par Ferdinand.” The priest Echeverría, who forged the relics of the ancient Alcazaba of Granada,[83] was careful to repeat this fable in the twenty-sixth chapter of his Paseos por Granada. The first edition of this work was published in 1764, under the assumed name of Joseph Romero Yranzo. There were then two vases and part of a third, all “lacerated, peeled, and maltreated.” The Englishman Swinburne wrote in 1776 that below the Towers of the Bell, “on the south-side, on a slip of terrace, is the governor's garden, a very pleasant walk, full of fine orange and cypress trees and myrtle hedges, but quite abandoned. The view it commands is incomparable. Two large vases enamelled with gold and azure foliages and characters are the only ornaments left: these were taken out of the vaults under the royal apartments.” In the second edition of Echeverría's Paseos, which was republished in 1814, it is added in a footnote that only a single vase remained, “in a room that overlooks the Court of Myrtles.” Lozano, however, in his Antigüedades Arabes, mentions two vases as existing at the same period. Argote de Molina (Nuevos Paseos por Granada, published about 1808) describes, together with the wretchedly executed marble statues in the Sala de las Ninfas, the “two or three great porcelain jars whereof some pieces only now remain,” and reminds us that according to the old tradition these statues looked continually towards the vases, which were full of treasure. Argote, nevertheless, takes Echeverría sharply to task for his absurdities upon this theme; and Washington Irving, a diligent gleaner in Echeverría's somewhat scanty field, makes use of the same material for his well-known story.

A more precise description is the following. The vase, which measures four feet six inches in height by eight feet two inches and a half in circumference, is of common earthenware painted with intricate devices fired after painting. This was a difficult operation in a vessel of such size; and here, in consequence, the colours have slightly run and mingled. Besides these technical flaws, the belly of the vase is broken clean in half, and one of the handles is missing. The shape is amphoraic, with a moderate downward curve. About the middle, surrounded by leaf and stem and geometrical devices effectively intertwined, are two antelopes. The vase is coloured blue and caramel upon a delicate yellow ground, and has a faint metallic lustre.[84] An Arabic inscription is repeated several times, and consists of the words “Felicity” and “Welcome.”

This vase is believed to date from the fourteenth century; and if we judge from the colour and composition of the earth employed, it appears probable that it was made at Granada. Together with the other vases which have disappeared,[85] it was doubtless meant to serve as a receptacle for water, and for decorating the chambers of the palace, where it would rest in amphora-fashion on a perforated stand, while smaller vases containing flowers would fill the niches which may yet be seen in various inner walls of the Alhambra. The belief of Argote[86] and many other writers that these niches were intended to receive the slippers of the Moors is utterly unfounded.

Until quite recently all published illustrations of the great jarrón de la Alhambra were inaccurate, and as a rule grotesquely so. Among the very worst are those inserted in the handbooks of Riaño and Contreras. I am glad to be able to reproduce an excellent photograph, which both corrects the atrocious cuts I have observed elsewhere, and relieves me from giving a prolix and possibly a wearisome description of the decoration on the vase.

Several other lustred vases of large size are still preserved in Spain and other countries. One, proceeding from a Sicilian church, is in the museum of Palermo. Wallis, who inserts an illustration, describes it as “amphora-shaped, with two large flat handles; pear-shaped body, long neck, ribbed at lower part, canellated above, moulded lip. Whitish body, tin glaze. Ornament painted in gold lustre on white ground, the pattern in parts almost obliterated. Hispano-Moresque. Height, one metre, seventeen centimetres.”

Another of these great vases belonged to the painter Fortuny, and was sold at his death to Prince Basilewsky, for thirty thousand francs. It was found by Fortuny at the village of Salar, near Granada, and purchased by him at a low price. “The neck and mouth resemble those of the Alhambra vase. The ornamentation is distributed about the body of the vase in four zones; one of the two central zones has tangent circles, and the other an inscription.”

Another large lustred vase is in the museum of Madrid (Plate lx.). It was found by a labourer at Hornos in the province of Jaen, and passed into the hands of the village priest, who placed it in his church to support the font of holy water. In course of time a dealer in antiquities, by name Amat, happened to pass that way, observed the vase, and made an offer for it to the padre. This latter at first refused, but subsequently, stimulated by an ignorant though well-intentioned and disinterested zeal for bettering the temple, he stipulated that if the dealer provided a new support of marble for the font, and paid for white washing the church, he might bear off the coveted jarrón. Fulfilling these conditions at all speed, he mounted the precious vessel on an ass, and briskly strode away. When he had gone a little distance the villagers, missing their cherished vase, though unaware, of course, of its artistic worth, swarmed angrily about the purchaser, flourished their knives and sticks at him, and pelted him with stones. At this he called upon the mayor for protection; the mayor provided him with two armed men for bodyguard, and, thus defended, the indomitable dealer reached Madrid and sold his jar to government for fifteen hundred dollars. Its present value is estimated at not less than thirty thousand.[87]

One of the earliest and most interesting notices relating to the preparation of this lustred ware is contained in a description by one of the royal archers, named Henry Cock, of the progress, performed in 1585, of Philip the Second from the court of Spain to Zaragoza.[88] Cock wrote of Muel, in Aragon:—“Almost all the inhabitants of this village are potters, and all the earthenware sold at Zaragoza is made in the following manner. The vessels are first fashioned to the required shape from a certain substance extracted from the earth of this locality. They are next baked in a specially constructed oven, and when removed from this are varnished with white varnish and polished, after which they are washed with a mixture of twenty-five pounds of lead, three or four pounds of tin, and as many pounds of a certain sand which is found there. All these ingredients are mixed into a paste resembling ice, which is broken small, pounded like flour, and kept in powder. This powder is mixed with water, the dishes are passed through it, and after being rebaked they keep their lustre. Next, in order to gild the pottery, they take the strongest vinegar mixed with about two reales of powdered silver, vermilion, and red ochre, and a little wire. When all is thoroughly mixed they paint the patterns on the dishes with a feather, bake them again, and their gold colour is now quite permanent. I was told all this by the potters themselves.”[89]

Another most interesting account of the manufacture of lustred ware was discovered in manuscript by Riaño in the British Museum, and, although it belongs to a later date (1785), is well worth quoting fully. It consists of a report upon the later gilded pottery of Manises, and was drawn up by order of the Count of Floridablanca:—

“After the pottery is baked, it is varnished with white and blue, the only colours used besides the gold lustre; the vessels are again baked; if the objects are to be painted with gold colour, this can only be put on the white varnish, after they have gone twice through the oven. The vessels are then painted with the said gold colour and are baked a third time, with only dry rosemary for fuel.

“The white varnish used is composed of lead and tin, which are melted together in an oven made on purpose; after these materials are sufficiently melted, they become like earth, and when in this state the mixture is removed and mixed with an equal quantity in weight of sand: fine salt is added to it, it is boiled again, and when cold, pounded into powder. The only sand which can be used is from a cave at Benalguacil, three leagues from Manises. In order that the varnish should be fine, for every arroba, twenty-five pounds of lead, six to twelve ounces of tin must be added, and half a bushel of finely-powdered salt: if a coarse kind is required, it is sufficient to add a very small quantity of tin, and three or four cuartos worth of salt, which in this case must be added when the ingredient is ready for varnishing the vessel.

“Five ingredients enter into the composition of the gold colour: copper, which is better the older it is; silver, as old as possible; sulphur; red ochre; and strong vinegar, which are mixed in the following proportions: of copper three ounces, of red ochre twelve ounces, of silver one peseta (about a shilling), sulphur three ounces, vinegar a quart; three pounds (of twelve ounces) of the earth or scoriæ, which is left after this pottery is painted with the gold colour, is added to the other ingredients.

“They are mixed in the following manner: a small portion of sulphur in powder is put into a casserole with two small bits of copper, between them a coin of one silver peseta; the rest of the sulphur and copper is then added to it. When this casserole is ready, it is placed on the fire, and is made to boil until the sulphur is consumed, which is evident when no flame issues from it. The preparation is then taken from the fire, and when cold is pounded very fine; the red ochre and scoriæ are then added to it; it is mixed up by hand and again pounded into powder. The preparation is placed in a basin and mixed with enough water to make a sufficient paste to stick on the sides of the basin; the mixture is then rubbed on the vessel with a stick; it is therefore indispensable that the water should be added very gradually until the mixture is in the proper state.

“The basin ready prepared must be placed in an oven for six hours. At Manises it is customary to do so when the vessels of common pottery are baked; after this the mixture is scratched off the sides of the basin with some iron instrument; it is then removed from there and broken up into small pieces, which are pounded fine in a hand-mortar with the quantity of vinegar already mentioned, and after having been well ground and pounded together for two hours the mixture is ready for decorating. It is well to observe that the quantity of varnish and gold-coloured mixture which is required for every object can only be ascertained by practice.”

Nevertheless, the gilded ware of the kingdom of Valencia had by this time deteriorated very greatly. Formerly, from as far back as the reign of Jayme the Conqueror, the other towns or villages of this region which produced the lustred and non-lustred pottery were Játiva, Paterna, Quarte, Villalonga, Alaqua, Carcer, and Moncada. Early in the fourteenth century fourteen potteries were working in the town of Biar, and twenty-three at Traiguera. Manises, however, maintained the lead for many years. The notices of Eximenes and other writers concerning the pottery of this town have been already quoted. The same ware is mentioned in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries by Diago (1613), Francisco Jávier Borrell, Beuter, and Martin de Viciana. Marineus Siculus, the chronicler of Ferdinand and Isabella, adds that similar or identical pottery (“desta misma arte”) was made in Murcia, whose manufacture of it had been praised in earlier times by Ibn-Said. Toledo also manufactured gilded ware with blue or bistre colouring. García Llansó says that in the sixteenth century this capital produced plates which contain the arms of Spain in the centre, the rest of the plate being completely covered with minute geometrical or floral ornamentation.

It is certain that during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries large quantities of lustred pottery were produced in many parts of Andalusia, Castile, Aragon, and Valencia. The oldest and most valuable specimens of this pottery are those which have the palest and most purely golden lustre, combined with blue or bluish decoration in the form of animals, coats of arms, or foliage. The lustred ware of Manises began to deteriorate about the time of the expulsion of the Moriscos, when the leaves and fronds of a clean gold tone upon a lightish ground are replaced by commoner and coarser patterns, and the gold itself by the coppery lustre which is still employed.

After the seventeenth century the further decline of this once famous industry may be traced from the accounts of travellers. Towards the middle of this century Bowles wrote that “two leagues from the capital (Valencia) is a fair-looking town of only four streets, whose occupants are nearly all potters. They make a copper-coloured ware of great beauty, used for common purposes and for decorating the houses of the working-people of the province. They make this ware of an argillaceous earth resembling in its colour and composition that portion of the soil of Valencia which produces native mercury…. The objects they fashion of this earth possess a glitter and are very inexpensive, since I purchased half a dozen plates for a real. Nevertheless, this is not the ware which has the highest reputation in the kingdom of Valencia. The factory which the Count of Aranda has established at Alcora is not surpassed in Europe, and is ahead of many in fineness of substance, hardness of the varnish, and elegance of form. It would be perfect of its kind if the varnish did not crack and peel off so easily.”

According to Laborde, early in the nineteenth century Manises contained two potteries “of considerable extent, which employ seventy workmen. The people occupied in these possess the art of producing a gold bronze colour which they carefully keep a secret, never communicating it to any person.” Elsewhere in the same book Laborde is more explicit. “Manises is a village situated a league and a quarter north of Valencia. It is seen on the left coming from New Castile. It is noted for its manufactories of earthen ware, which employ thirty kilns, and occupy a great part of the inhabitants. The women are employed in forming the designs and applying the colours. There are two large manufactories of a superior kind, the earthen ware of which is tolerably fine, of a beautiful white, and a moderate price. They also make here vases worked with a great degree of delicacy.”

Among the earliest specimens are the vase of the Alhambra, those which are now in the museums of Palermo and Madrid, that which belonged to Fortuny, and the plaque which once was also his, and now forms part of the Osma collection. Lustred Spanish tiles are scarce. A few exist at Seville[90] and Granada, chiefly in altar-fronts, along the archivolts of doorways, or, with heraldic motives, on the inner walls of houses of the aristocracy. Invariably, says Gestoso, such tiles are coloured with combinations of white, blue, and gold, since in the lustre process other colours—black, or green, or deepish yellow—proved unsatisfactory. Other lustred tiles of exquisite beauty are owned by Señor Osma, (Plate lxi.), and seem to have even gained in brilliance by the centuries that have passed over them. Riaño gives a list of the specimens of this pottery which are at South Kensington, consisting of bowls, vases, and plates. One of the vases is particularly beautiful. It dates from the fifteenth century, and is described by Fortnum as having “a spherical body on a trumpet-shaped base, with a neck of elongated funnel form, flanked by two large wing-shaped handles perforated with circular holes. The surface, except the mouldings, is entirely covered with a diaper-pattern of ivy or briony leaves, tendrils, and small flowers in brownish lustre and blue on the white ground.”

Through the courtesy of Señor Osma I am able to give illustrations of a few of the finest specimens of lustred ware in his magnificent collection (Plates lxii.–lxvi.). The three small vessels facing pages 176, 178, and 180 are of Valencian workmanship, and date, according to their owner, from between 1460 and 1480. The two plates are also Valencian. The one with a bull in the centre dates from between 1480 and 1500; and that which has a greyhound from slightly earlier—say 1470 to 1490.

POTTERY OF SEVILLE, PUENTE DEL ARZOBISPO, TALAVERA DE LA REINA, TOLEDO, AND BARCELONA; POROUS WARE; PORCELAIN OF ALCORA AND THE ROYAL FACTORY OF THE BUEN RETIRO.

We have seen that Seville was an early and important centre of the potter's craft in Spain. Her potteries were celebrated even with the Romans, and probably have at no moment been inactive. Fifty, established in the suburb of Triana, were mentioned in the sixteenth century by Pedro de Medina, and documents which tell of many more have recently been discovered by Gestoso. The excellence of the Seville tiles has been described in a preceding section of this chapter. Their production still continues upon a large scale; and the ware of the Cartuja factory, which reached the zenith of its fame towards the end of the eighteenth century, is considered by Jacquemart and other authorities to rival with the Italian wares of Savona.

Pottery made in other parts of the Peninsula—particularly that of Talavera de la Reina—is known to have been imitated by the Seville potters with embarrassing perfection. In the case of the so-called “loza de Puente del Arzobispo,” it is the Seville ware itself which seems to have been imitated. Puente del Arzobispo is a small village near Toledo. Mendez wrote of it in the seventeenth century:—“Fine pottery is manufactured in about eight kilns, which produce more than 40,000 ducats yearly.” “In 1755,” says Riaño, “thirteen pottery kilns existed at this place; they still worked in 1791, but their productions were very inferior in artistic merit.”

Not many years ago the name of Puente del Arzobispo was connected by Baron Davillier with certain polychrome non-lustred plates and other vessels which are greatly esteemed for their rarity, and of which a few specimens exist in the South Kensington and other museums, as well as in one or two private collections, such as that of Señor Osma.

Gestoso says that the usual diameter of these plates is either twenty-three centimetres or forty-two centimetres. “Their decoration, betraying at a glance the Saracenic influence, consists of leaves and flowers, together with animals of a more or less fantastic character: lions, rabbits, and birds. In other specimens the centre is occupied by a heart, fleurs-de-lis, or other fancy devices, or yet, in some few cases, with the head of a man or woman. These central designs are surrounded with leaves and flowers. The draughtsmanship upon these plates is of the rudest, and the process of their colouring was as follows. The figures were drawn upon the unfired surface in manganese ink mixed with a greasy substance; and after this the aqueous enamel or glaze was allowed to drop from a hogshair brush into the spaces which the black had outlined.”

This will be recognized as the cuerda seca process, so extensively employed in making Seville tiles. Nevertheless, judging by certain marks upon this pottery, Baron Davillier declared it to proceed from Puente del Arzobispo. The marks in question consist in one or two examples of what appears to be the letters A.P. or P.A.[91] Davillier, however, affirmed that he had seen a plate fully inscribed as follows:—

The existence of this plate is now discredited; at least, no trace of it can be discovered at this day. Upon the other hand, Gestoso points to various objects manufactured by the cuerda seca method, and which undoubtedly proceed from Seville. Among them are three shields, one of which, containing the arms of Ferdinand and Isabella, is of exceptional interest, for it is accompanied by an inscribed slab, evidently coeval with the shield itself, recording it to have been made in the year 1503, and by Jerónimo Suarez. This shield and slab were removed from a courtyard of the old Alhóndiga to Seville Museum, where they now remain. Of the two other shields, one belongs to Señor Osma, and the second, which is still at Seville, adorns the tomb of Don León Enriquez in the church of Santa Paula; and since it is unquestionable that all these cuerda seca shields, as well as quantities of cuerda seca tiles, were made at Seville, Gestoso prudently suggests that we should designate as “cuerda seca ware” that pottery which has hitherto passed as specially belonging to Puente del Arzobispo. In fact, towards the end of the fifteenth century this pottery is found extending northward from Seville to Toledo, and Señor Osma assures me that Toledo specimens are of a somewhat later manufacture than those which were produced at Seville. One of the rarest and most interesting cuerda seca plates in this gentleman's collection is reproduced herewith (lxviii.). No other plate of similar pattern is known to exist. Its date may be placed between 1480 and 1495, and it gives a curious illustration of the masculine headdress and headwear in the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella.

The pottery of Talavera de la Reina was at one time much esteemed. The earliest mention of it, says Riaño, occurs in 1560, in a manuscript history of this town, while another notice, dated 1576, says that here was produced “fine white glazed earthenware and other pottery, which supplied the country, part of Portugal, and India.” More explicit are the observations of Father Alonso de Ajofrín, who wrote, in 1651, a history of Talavera. He says that “her pottery is as good as that of Pisa, while quantities of azulejos are made here to adorn the front of altars, churches, gardens, alcoves, saloons, and bowers, and large and small specimens of every kind. Two hundred workmen work at eight separate kilns. Four other kilns produce the commoner kinds of ware. Red porous clay vessels and drinking-cups are baked in two other kilns in a thousand shapes to imitate birds and other creatures; also brinquiños for the use of ladies, so deliciously flavoured that after drinking the water they contained, they eat the cup in which it was brought them.”

The following most interesting notice relating to this town is also quoted by Riaño: “The earthenware pottery made here has reached a great perfection; it is formed of white and red clay. Vases, cups, bucaros and brinquiños are made of different kinds, dishes and table centres, and imitations of snails, owls, dogs, and every kind of fruits, olives, and almonds. These objects are painted with great perfection, and the imitations of porcelain brought from the Portuguese Indies are most excellent. Everyone is surprised that in so small a town such excellent things should be made. The varnish used for the white pottery is made with tin and sand, and is now found to be more acceptable than coloured earthenware; so much so, that persons of importance who pass by this town, although they have in their houses dinner-services of silver, buy earthenware made at Talavera, on account of its excellence. The sand which was used to make the white varnish was brought from Hita, and is now found at Mejorada, near Talavera. This sand is as fine and soft as silk.

“The red pottery made at Talavera is much to be commended, for besides the great variety of objects, and the different medals which they place upon them, they have invented some small brinquiños of so small and delicate a kind, that the ladies wear them. Rosaries are also made of the same material. A certain scent is added in the manufacture of this pottery which excites the appetite and taste of the women, who eat the pottery so frequently that it gives great trouble to their confessors to check this custom.”

This porous pottery for keeping water cool had been imported from America, and was chiefly made in Andalusia, Portugal, and Extremadura. It is still produced at Andujar and elsewhere. Nearly all travellers in Spain describe it, and insist upon the curious circumstance that it was eaten by the Spanish women. “I have mentioned elsewhere,” wrote Countess d'Aulnoy, “the longing many women feel to chew this clay, which often obstructs their bodies internally. Their stomachs swell, and grow as hard as stone, while their skin turns yellow as a quince. I also felt a curiosity to taste this ware, that is so highly yet so undeservedly esteemed; but I would devour a grindstone rather than put it in my mouth again. Nevertheless, if one wants to be agreeable to the Spanish ladies, one has to present them with some bucaros, which they themselves call barros, and which, as many deem, possess such numerous and admirable qualities, since they claim for the clay that it cures sickness, and that a drinking vessel made of it betrays the presence of a poison. I possess one which spoils the taste of wine, but greatly improves water. This liquid seems to boil and tremble when it is thrown into the cup in question; but after a little while the vessel empties—so porous is the clay of which it is composed—and then it has a fragrant odour.”

Similar accounts are given by travellers of a later time. “I wish,” wrote Swinburne, “I could contrive a method of carrying you some of the fine earthen jars, called buxaros, which are made in Andalusia. They are remarkably convenient for water-drinkers, as they are light, smooth, and handy; being not more than half-baked, they are very porous, and the outside is kept moist by the water's filtering through; though placed in the sun, the water in the pots remains as cold as ice. The most disagreeable circumstance attending them is, that they emit a smell of earth refreshed by a sudden shower after a long drought.”[92]

Laborde, who wrote a few years later, seems to have copied some of his information from Bowles. “The Murcians,” he said, “use in their houses little jars called Bucaros, the same as those which in some parts of Andalusia are called Alcarrazas.[93] They have handles open at the top, are smaller at the bottom than above, and bulge in the middle; they are slight, porous, smooth, and half-baked; they are made of a peculiar kind of clay. When water is put into them, they emit a smell like that sent up by the earth after a shower of rain in summer. The water makes its way very slowly through the pores, and keeps them constantly moist on the outside; they are used to cool water for drinking. The windows and balconies of all the houses have large iron rings, with a flat surface, on which they are placed at night, and the water, oozing incessantly, becomes very cool.[94] In Andalusia some of these jars are white, and others red; in Murcia they have only white ones. They appear to be in every respect of the same nature as the evaporating vases of Africa, Egypt, Syria, and India, of which so much has been said by travellers, and on which the learned have made so many dissertations.”

The same vessels are noticed by Ford in his description of a Spanish posada. “Near the staircase downstairs, and always in a visible place, is a gibbous jar, tinaja, of the ancient classical amphora shape, filled with fresh water; and by it is a tin or copper utensil to take water out with, and often a row of small pipkins, made of a red porous clay,[95] which are kept ready filled with water, on, or rather in, a shelf fixed to the wall, and called la tallada, el taller. These pots, alcarrazas, from the constant evaporation, keep the water extremely cool. They are of various shapes, many, especially in Valencia and Andalusia, being of the unchanged identical form of those similar clay drinking-vessels discovered at Pompeii. They are the precise trulla. Martial speaks both of the colour and the material of those made at Saguntum, where they still are prepared in great quantities; they are not unlike the ckool'lehs of Egypt, which are made of the same material and for the same purposes, and represent the ancient Canobic κστατικα. They are seldom destined to be placed on the table; their bottoms being pointed and conical, they could not stand upright. This singular form was given to the vasa futilia, or cups used at the sacrifices of Vesta, which would have been defiled had they touched the ground. As soon, therefore, as they are drunk off, they are refilled and replaced in their holes on the shelf, as is done with decanters in our butlers' pantries.”[96]

I am only aware of one author who derides the statement that this porous clay was eaten by the Spanish women. According to Bowles, who certainly describes and comments on it with intelligence and scholarship, the neighbourhood of Andujar contains “large quantities of the white argil of which are made the jars or alcarrazas which serve in many parts of Spain for cooling water in the summer-time. In other parts of Andalusia is found a red variety of this clay, employed in making the vessels known as búcaros, which serve to freshen the water as well as for drinking it out of—a thing the Spanish ladies love greatly. Both the white alcarrazas and the búcaros as red as the blood of a bull are thin, porous, smooth, and half-baked. When filled with water they emit a pleasant smell like that of dry earth rained upon in summer, and as the water filters through the outer surface, remain continually damp.” The same writer adds that at that time (1752) the búcaros proceeding from the Indies were of finer workmanship, and had a more agreeable smell than those of Spanish manufacture. “In the Encyclopædia,” he continues, “and in the Dictionary of Natural History, we read that Spanish ladies are for ever chewing búcaro, and that the hardest penance their confessors can inflict upon them is to deprive them for a single day of this enjoyment.” Bowles, however, quotes these observations in a scornful tone, and deprecates the habit of “believing writers who without inquiring into things, concoct and publish novels to divert the populace and rid them of their money.”

Turning our attention once again to the finer kinds of Talavera ware, Gestoso adduces proofs that this as well as Chinese porcelain was faultlessly and freely imitated in the potteries of Seville. Here, therefore, is a source of fresh confusion; and probably a great proportion of the polychrome ware which goes by the name of Talaveran is really of Sevillian origin. It is further known that at one period, which seems to begin with the second half of the sixteenth century, potters who were natives of Talavera were hired to work in Seville.

It has not been ascertained when Talavera herself grew celebrated for this industry. García Llansó supposes that at first, before it felt the influence of Italy and France, her pottery was partly Mudejar, and vestiges of oriental art survive in fairly late examples. The characteristic colour-scheme was either blue on white, or else the decoration is more variegated. Riaño says:—“Although we find by the remarks we have quoted from contemporary authors that earthenware of every description was made at Talavera, the specimens which are more generally met with may be divided into two groups, which are painted on a white ground, either in blue, or in colours, in the manner of Italian maiolica. The most important examples which have reached us consist of bowls of different sizes, dishes, vases (Plate lxx.), tinajas, holy-water vessels, medicine jars, and wall decoration. Blue oriental china was imitated to a vast extent: the colouring was successful, but the design was an imitation of the baroque school of the time, and the figures, landscapes, and decoration follow the bad taste so general in Spain in the eighteenth century. The imitations of Italian maiolica are effective. The colours most commonly used are manganese, orange, blue, and green.”

Talavera maintained her reputation for pottery till nearly the middle of the eighteenth century, supporting more than six hundred workmen employed in eight large potteries.[97] From then onwards the trade declined, and by the close of the same century was practically dead, owing, Larruga tells us, to the constantly increasing cost of prime materials. Nevertheless, the Crown made efforts to revive the craft, and met with some success till 1777, in which year four establishments (locally known as barrerías) for making common pottery were opened in the same town, and speedily crushed their rivals. “The potteries of Talavera,” wrote Laborde soon after this, “were greatly celebrated for many years, and supplied a lucrative and important branch of commerce. They are evidently on the decline. The manufactories are reduced to seven or eight. These productions no longer exhibit the same delicacy of execution. Their designs are also lamentably defective. The material employed in them is a certain earth which is found near Calera, three leagues from Talavera.”

The older Talavera ware, decorated, as a rule, with horses, birds, hunting-scenes, or coats of arms, is seldom met with nowadays. Although it is not particularly choice, the drawing is firm, and the colouring vigorous and agreeable.

I have said that pottery continued to be made in Aragon, at Muel, Villafeliche, and other places. In course of time these local industries were also suffered to decay. Laborde says that early in the nineteenth century the Villafeliche factory employed thirty-eight workmen. “The ware is of a very inferior sort. This article might be carried to a greater extent. In several parts of the province, earth is found of an excellent quality for earthenware, particularly in Zaragoza and in Tauste; the latter affords the best, which is very fine, and of three colours, and would answer for the making of porcelain.”

In the eighteenth century Toledo, upon the initiative of Don Ignacio Velasco, produced good imitations of Genoese ware, while other kinds of pottery were made at Teruel, Valladolid, Jaen, Zamora, Segovia, Puente del Arzobispo, and in the Balearic Islands. Another region which continued to be a most important centre of the potter's craft was Cataluña, where it had always been encouraged by this thrifty and art-loving people. As early as the year 1257 two potters occupied a place upon the municipal council of Barcelona, while the potters' guild was strictly regulated from the beginning of the fourteenth century.[98] At the same time two whole streets in the centre of the town, as well as others in the suburbs, were occupied by potters. The ancient names of these streets are yet retained in the Calles Escudillers, Escudillers Blancs (white varnished pottery), Obradors (where many of the potteries were situated), and Tallers (i.e. the potteries for producing common ware).

The pottery of Cataluña generally was largely exported to Sicily, Alexandria, and other parts. Among the places in this region which produced it were Tarragona, Tortosa, and Villafranca. In 1528 the municipal council of the capital herself forbade, as a protective measure, the introduction into Barcelona of local pottery made at Malgrat, La Selva, and other towns and villages of this neighbourhood. In 1546 the Portuguese Barreyros declared in his work Chorografía de algunos lugares that the Barcelona ware surpassed all other classes made in Spain, including the Valencian. She continued to produce good pottery all through the sixteenth century, and excellent common ware until considerably later.[99]

About the beginning of the eighteenth century Laborde mentioned as working centres of this craft “manufactories of delf-ware at Avilés, Gijón, Oviedo, Nava, and Cangas de Onis, in the Asturias; at Segovia in Old Castile; at Puente del Arzobispo and Talavera de la Reina in New Castile; at Seville in the kingdom of that name; at Villafeliche in Aragon; at Onda, Alcora, and Manises, in the kingdom of Valencia; at San Andero in Biscay; and at Tortosa in Cataluña…. The most important of these potteries is the one at Alcora, the delf of which is tolerably fine, though not of the first quality. No china is made, except at Alcora and Madrid: that of the former place is very common, and inconsiderable as to quantity. The china manufactured at Madrid is beautiful, and without exaggeration may be considered as equalling that of Sèvres. It is a royal pottery; but it is impossible to give any description of its state, because admission to the interior of the manufactory is strictly prohibited.”

Ricord states in his pamphlet relative to Valencian industries that in 1791 factories of high-class pottery were working in the kingdom of Valencia, at Onda, Alcora, Ribesalves, Manises, Eslida, and Bechí; and of common ware at San Felipe, Morella, Manises, Murviedro, Alicante, Moncada, Orihuela, Segorbe, and other towns and villages of this locality. In all, there were throughout the province eighty-seven of these latter potteries, besides two hundred and twenty tileries, and four factories of artistic tiles or azulejos established at Valencia. The yearly output of these azulejerias was 150,000 tiles, 20,000 of which were exported to Andalusia and Castile.

Although the pottery of Alcora only achieved distinction at a later age, this craft had long been practised in the neighbourhood. This circumstance induced the Count of Aranda to found here, in 1726, a large factory for producing costly and artistic ware. Riaño obtained permission to examine the archives of the family of Aranda, with their mass of documents relating to this enterprise. His notice of Alcora ware is therefore most complete and valuable, and has been copied, frequently without acknowledgment, by almost every writer on the subject.

It appears from these archives that the cost of building and opening the factory of Alcora amounted to about £10,000. The works were placed beneath the supervision of Don Joaquín Joseph de Sayas, at the same time that a Frenchman named Ollery was engaged at a good salary and brought from Moustiers to act as principal draughtsman. A couple of years later Count Aranda paid Ollery the high compliment of saying that “the fine and numerous models which he has designed, have contributed to make my manufacture the first in Spain.” He seems to have retired in 1737, when the Count rewarded him with a yearly pension of five hundred francs besides the amount of his salary, “for his especial zeal in the improvement of the manufactory, and his great skill in directing the construction of every kind of work.” Riaño adds that from this date until the manufacture of porcelain in 1764, only Spanish artists worked at Alcora.

The products of this factory continued to improve, and reached, in course of time, a yearly total of about three hundred thousand objects. The ordinances, which are dated between 1732 and 1733, tell us that “in these works of ours no pottery should be made except the very finest, similar to the Chinese, and of as fine an earth. The models and wheels should be perfect, the drawing first-rate, the varnish and colours excellent, and the pottery light and of the highest quality, for it is our express wish that the best pottery should only be distinguished from that of an inferior kind by the greater or less amount of painting which covers it.”

Not less interesting are certain communications, copied by Riaño, which passed in 1746 between the Spanish Tribunal of Commerce and the Count of Aranda, in which it is stated that “the perfection of the earthenware of Alcora consists in the excellent models which have been made by competent foreign artists, as well as in the quality of the earth and the recipes brought at great cost from abroad.” We learn from the same document that “from the earliest period of the manufacture, pyramids with figures of children, holding garlands of flowers and baskets of fruits on their heads, were made with great perfection; also brackets, centre and three-cornered tables, large objects, some as large as five feet high, to be placed upon them, chandeliers, cornucopias, statues of different kinds, and animals of different sorts and sizes. The entire ornamentation of a room has also been made here; the work is so perfect that nothing in Spain, France, Italy, or Holland could equal it in merit.”

It is not necessary to follow in close detail all the modifications and vicissitudes (extending over quite a hundred years) which affected the Alcora factory. I therefore only take some general notices from Riaño. In 1750 Count Aranda transferred the works to a private company, which remained in possession of them until 1766. In 1741 a Frenchman named François Haly was engaged for ten years, and with a yearly salary of rather more than a thousand francs, under the following conditions:—

“That the travelling expenses of his wife and children should be given him, and that his salary should be paid as soon as he made before the Director and two competent judges the different kinds of porcelain which he had undertaken to make.” Haly agreed to surrender his recipes, and it was promised him that he should have two modellers and one painter working by his side, and that if in one year his porcelain were satisfactory, the Count would make him a present of a thousand tornoises.[100]

Porcelain was first produced at Alcora towards the middle of the eighteenth century. A contract was drawn up on March 24th, 1764, with a German called John Christian Knipfer, who had already worked there in the pottery section. By the original agreement, which exists in the archives, we find he was to prepare works of “porcelain and painting similar to those made at Dresden, during a period of six years, under the following conditions:—

“That the said Knipfer obliges himself to make and teach the apprentices the composition and perfection of porcelain paste, its varnishes, and colours, and whatever he may know at the present time, or discover during this period of six years; he is not to prevent the Director of the Works from being present at all the essays made.

“The said Knipfer offers to make and varnish porcelain, and to employ gold and silver in its decoration, and in that of the ordinary wares; likewise the colours of crimson, purple, violet, blues of different shades, yellow, greens, browns, reds, and black.

“That Knipfer will give up an account of his secrets, and the management and manner of using them, in order that in all times the truth of what he has asserted may be verified.”