With gilt copper cover / Height: 23.5 cm; 18.9 cm without cover / Meissen, 1710–13
Provenance: Collection of Dr Julius and Joan Jacobson; Collection of Ilse Bischoff, Sotheby’s New York, 24 February 1978, lot 75; Collection of Margarete Oppenheim, Julius Böhler, 18–20 May 1936, lot 767, pl. 49 — the sale of the tankard is based on an agreement with the Oppenheim heirs.
Alongside the marbled and enamelled early Böttger stoneware tankards, and the Schwartz Porcelain tankards decorated by Martin Schnell, the shell-moulded and polished examples rank among the most precious and rarest. Fewer than ten pieces are known today from each of these groups.
Beer tankards already formed part of the young manufactory’s first production programme, as shown by the range proudly announced in the Leipziger Zeitung of 4 May 1710 for the first Leipzig Spring Fair.
The tankards were a successful model. This is already evident from one of the manufactory’s earliest inventories, dated 3 August 1711 (Boltz in KfS 96/1982, p. 35). In a section devoted specifically to beer tankards, no fewer than 388 examples are listed. Among them, however, there was not a single high shell-moulded beer tankard. Only 21 low shell-moulded beer tankards in fired condition and 53 low, still unfired examples are recorded. As far as is known, not a single one of these has survived.
After Böttger’s death on 3 March 1719, all remaining stock held by the manufactory was inventoried. Among more than 2,000 entries, only a single shell-moulded and polished stoneware tankard is recorded, in the Royal porcelain warehouse in Leipzig (Boltz in Keramos 167–168/2000, p. 44), under no. 6: “gemuschelt, geschnitten, poliert” — shell-moulded, cut, polished. On p. 46, the same tankard is further described as “ein gemuschelt = geschnittener dit. (Tischkrug) ohne Deckel, auswendig poliert” — a shell-moulded/cut table tankard without cover, polished on the outside.
This documentation underlines the rarity of shell-moulded stoneware tankards. It may also explain why, to date, no shell-moulded beer tankard from the rich holdings of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden has been published.
Böttger’s estate was not finally settled until shortly after the death of Augustus the Strong on 1 February 1733. The remaining stock was incorporated into the Royal Collections of the Japanese Palace against settlement of the debts of the estate (Boltz in Keramos 153/1996, p. 111). In the detailed delivery list of 15 March 1733 for the “braun polierte Porcelain”, this tankard is absent (Boltz, ibid., p. 113). It must therefore have been sold or given away between 1719 and 1733.
The first inventory of the Japanese Palace, kept from 1721 initially until May 1727, likewise contains no shell-moulded tankard. It appears that the tankards produced between 1710 and 1713, that is, up to the end of production, had already been disposed of, with the exception of the example mentioned above. They could therefore no longer be incorporated into the Royal Collections.
We date our shell-moulded tankard to between 1710 and 1713, the period of Böttger stoneware production. The Bohemian glass cutters and polishers employed by Böttger to refine the stoneware were dismissed again when the production of “Weißporcelain” began in 1713.
On the basis of the Leipzig inventory entry of 1711 cited above, Claus Boltz redefined the principle of shell-moulding (KFS 96/1982, Appendix I, p. 35, no. 185). The shell-moulding of the beer tankards was not, as previously assumed, cut into the surface after firing, but formed before firing (cf. Zimmermann, Frühzeit und Erfindung, p. 78 and fn. 208; Menzhausen 1969, p. 15; further Pietsch/Syndram 2009, p. 44, and Pietsch, Lübeck, p. 7). The inventory entry expressly refers to “ungebrannten gemuschelten Krügen” — unfired shell-moulded tankards.
The shell-moulding served to give the polished stoneware tankards additional brilliance. The facetted, undulating surface enhanced the play of light and substantially increased the aesthetic appeal of these rare pieces.
Addendum
Angela Gräfin von Wallwitz, a recognised expert in the field of Böttger stoneware, regards the freely executed shell-moulding of our tankard as a characteristic of a very early stage of development. She considers it possible that the piece was made before the manufactory was transferred to Meissen on 6 June 1710.
Comparative examples
We have been able to identify only a few examples:
