Harvest jug

Martin Brothers pottery was founded by (Robert) Wallace Martin in 1873 and throughout its years of operation Wallace was joined at different times by his brothers Edwin, Walter and Charles. Specialising in salt glaze, Martin Brothers produced low-volume art pottery, with their work considered today as the precursor of the twentieth-century studio pottery movement. The Harvest jug is emblematic of the concerns of the British Arts and Crafts Movement, which embraced form and function to ensure that the beauty of the design and decoration did not detract from its function as a useful object.

The folkloric ode on the body informs us of the purpose of the vessel and reads:

            Welcome my friends, drinke with  noble hearte,

But yet, before you drinke too much, departe,

For though good drinke will make 

a coward stout,

Yet when too much is in, the wit is out.

An arresting feature of this pot is the beautifully incised and painted Lilium auratum or golden-rayed lily of Japan, which had been first cultivated in Britain by plantsman John Gould Veitch in 1862. This lilium ultimately became symbolic of the Victorian penchant for collecting and cultivating exotic plants.

Tansy Curtin, Curator of International Art Pre-1980