Beard man's mug

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World's largest beard man's mug
Bartmannsbrunnen in Frechen by Olaf Höhnen
Beard man's mug

A beard man's jug is a bulbous, brown glazed clay vessel with the eponymous relief of a bearded male face on the neck.

Manufacture and sale

Georg Flegel : Still Life with Herring and Bartmann's Jug
Coat of arms of Frechen with Bartmann's mug

Bartmann pitchers were produced in large numbers from the 16th to the 18th century , including in Frechen near Cologne, and mostly consist of Rhenish stoneware .

An unglazed Bartmann's jug from the 13th to 14th centuries was found in Bardowick . Bartmann jugs made of Waldenburg stoneware were found in Potsdam during excavations . Century to be dated.

The Bartmann mug was extremely popular for a long time and was produced for regional sales as well as for the national market. The great demand in England and Holland in particular made it an important export item . There they were called Greybeards or Bellarmines ; the latter name is derived from Cardinal Bellarmino, who was known at the time and hated in England . In the 20th century, farmers in the Bremen area were still calling (undecorated) clay bottles with handles that were used to take coffee with them to work in the fields, although they had long since ceased to be a beard mask as a decoration.

Meaning of the beard mask

Whether the mask-like representation of the face has a forgotten symbolic content is controversial among art historians and has not yet been clearly answered. There are different interpretations according to which the bearded faces represented God the Father , among other things , served as apotropaion for magical purposes or represented the owner or user of the jug and encouraged self-reflection through contemplation . In contrast, other historians take the view that the facial representations had no special meaning, but served exclusively decorative purposes, since mask-like bearded faces in the Renaissance as decorative elements corresponded to the taste of the time without any symbolism and were accordingly often used.

Literary

Ernst Bloch gives a literary arabesque for the Bartmann's mug in his influential early work "Geist der Utopie" (Leipzig 1918, p. 14f.). The jug turns into an allegory of art or, even further, of a style of philosophical thought that wants to do justice to things:

"But whoever loves him realizes how superficial the precious jugs are, and he prefers the brown, hulking device, almost without a neck, with a wild man's face and a significant, snail-like, sun-like sign of arching, over these brothers."

Theodor W. Adorno discusses this text in his autobiographical miniature “Henkel, Krug and early experience” in contrast to Georg Simmel's remarks on an antique vase (see Adorno, Noten zur Literatur, ffm. 1981, pp. 556ff.). In this context, Martin Heidegger's reflections on “Das Ding”, which, for example, get such a jug, are also worth considering (see Martin Heidegger, lectures and essays, Pfullingen 1954).

See also

literature

  • Theodor W. Adorno: Notes on literature. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt / M. 1998, ISBN 3-518-27955-6
  • Ernst Bloch Spirit of Utopia , (work edition; Vol. 3), Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt / M. 1991, ISBN 3-518-28152-6
  • Karl Göbels: Rhenish pottery, shown using the example of the Frechen jug, Düppen and pipe bakers , published by the city of Frechen. Bartmann-Verlag GmbH, Frechen 1971.
  • Elsa Hähnel, Joseph Halm: Siegburger Bartmann jugs. In: Elsa Hähnel: Siegburger Steinzeug. Inventory catalog in 2 volumes, guides and publications from the Rheinisches Freilichtmuseum and Landesmuseum für Volkskunde in Kommern, No. 37. Cologne 1992 (Volume 2). Pp. 66-132.
  • Martin Heidegger: lectures and essays. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-608-91090-5
  • Gisela Reineking von Bock: The development of the beard mask on Rhenish stoneware. KERAMOS. Journal of the Society of Ceramic Friends V., Düsseldorf. Issue 34, October 1966. pp. 30-43.
  • Ingeborg Unger: Cologne and Frechen stoneware of the Renaissance. The holdings of the Cologne City Museum. Edited by Werner Schäfke. Publications of the Cologne City Museum Volume 8. 549 pages. Verlag Kölnisches Stadtmuseum , Cologne 2007. ISBN 978-3-940042-01-9

Individual evidence

  1. F.-W. Wulf: In: Archeology in Germany AiD 2014/5, page 51
  2. State capital Potsdam: Potsdam Stadtmitte , 2nd updated edition 2008, p. 12 ( Memento of July 30, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF file; 4.48 MB)
  3. HHMeier in: Exhibition catalog "Water", Focke-Museum Bremen 1988, cat. No. 65, p. 167.

Web links

Commons : Bartmannskrug  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files