Cheeky stoneware
Frechen stoneware is a type of ceramic product that was manufactured in Frechen from the early modern period .
At the Frechen location, stoneware vessels were produced without interruption from the beginning of the 16th century to the late 19th century, with the main production phase being in the 16th and 17th centuries. The range mainly includes jugs for use in private households and taprooms. Bartmann jugs , which became the trademark of Rhenish Renaissance stoneware, are among the best-known products of the Frechen stoneware production .
The city of Frechen still has a Bartmann mug in its coat of arms.
history
The first documentary mention of a pottery company in Frechen that produced real stoneware dates back to 1544. However, stoneware production can be assumed to have started shortly after 1500.
As early as the middle of the 15th century, Cologne master potters had also started producing real stoneware . The high-quality technical and handcrafted products from Cologne's Kannenbäcker were popular with the citizens of Cologne and quickly became an export hit. However, the population feared the high risk of fire from the operation of the kilns. In addition, the stoneware production brought further inconveniences for the residents, such as the annoying smell of chlorine caused by the salt glaze being poured on or increased prices for firewood. Before the middle of the 16th century, the city council continued to restrict stoneware production. The majority of Cologne's kettle bakers settled in neighboring Frechen, from where they had always obtained the raw clay . The other Cologne potters had migrated to the traditional pottery centers of Siegburg and Raeren . From 1566 stoneware stoves were no longer permitted within the Cologne city walls. However, the Hanseatic city remained the most important transshipment point for Rhenish stoneware even for stoneware potters who had emigrated. This is how the Frechen stoneware jugs made their way across the Rhine to the Netherlands and from there to England , where they were steadily replacing Raeren vessels as early as the mid-16th century. The Frechener Bartmann mugs in particular enjoyed great popularity on the British Isles. In English workshops, lids made of tin or silver were attached to stoneware jugs on various occasions, which increased their value.
In contrast to most of the other Rhenish stoneware centers, the Frechen pottery was able to produce until the late 19th century without interruption due to economic losses or the effects of the war. In 1856 the master potters founded the Frechen pottery guild.
technology
Due to the common history and the technical proximity to the Cologne jug bakers, the goods from the Frechen stoneware production of the 16th century are difficult to distinguish from the goods from the Cologne workshops. The clay deposits to the west of Cologne, which the Frechen potters could fall back on, just like the Cologne people before them, supplied low-iron, white-burning stoneware clays. They also used very iron-rich clays for the engobe. Due to the iron content, the surfaces of the vessels looked dirty brown. Thick sprues made of salt glazes made the surface look more harmonious, which gave the vessels a spotty or tortoiseshell-like appearance. In this it is indistinguishable from Cologne stoneware.
Form spectrum and development
The range of shapes of the Cologne workshops was already rather sparse compared to the products of the pottery centers in Siegburg, Langerwehe and Raeren. The range of shapes of the Frechen stoneware is even smaller than that of Cologne. Bulbous jugs with a spherical body are characteristic of Frechen stoneware. Cups or similar vessel types are rarely found in the spectrum.
Until the middle of the 16th century, the jugs were hardly distinguishable from Cologne products. The shape of the jugs changes from bulbous, compact Renaissance shapes with a short neck and wide mouth to baroque vessel types. These became more and more elongated in the course of the late 16th and 17th centuries. The neck of the vessel becomes longer and the mouth narrower.
In the late phase of stoneware production in Frechen, large storage vessels complement the range.
Bartmann mug
Pear-shaped drinking and serving mugs are called Bartmannkrug and carry a single bearded male face mask on the neck and shoulder of the vessel. Starting from jugs with primitive incised facial contours from the 15th century, this special form of jugs was developed in Cologne from around 1500, which can be found in almost all Rhenish pottery centers in the 16th century. In the spectrum of Frechen stoneware, the Bartmann mug is particularly well represented and is of high quality. Bartmann mugs were made in Frechen well into the 18th century. In the course of the late 16th century, the originally amicable facial expression of the beard mask that was put on changed into a smiling facial expression. In the 17th century it turns into a grotesque grimace.
Stoneware pipes
After Frechen's production of stoneware used ceramics had lost its national importance in the 18th century, another stoneware product gained economic importance for the region in the 19th century with the industrial production of line pipes. In 1852 Heinrich Eduard Sticker founded the first stoneware pipe factory in Breite Straße. However, just five years later, in 1857, the factory was relocated to Cologne-Lindenthal. Further factories were set up in the area around Breite Straße. The manufacture of sewer pipes is still an important industry in Frechen today.
Firing aids
The firing aids used in Frechener as well as in Cologne stoneware production were called Platz or Plätzton . The firing aids were rectangular or square and the top was covered with fine sand. The approximately 0.6 - 1 cm thick platelets were cut from the flat rolled clay mass with a knife and often still have the imprints of the jar rim. Despite the adhering sand, which was supposed to make it easier to separate from the vessel, some pieces remained caked to the bottom or rim of the vessel due to the salt glaze. As a secondary use, the flat panels were laid with the glazed narrow sides facing up as a plätzton floor covering with herringbone ornaments or other ornamental patterns. These stacking aids were also used in stoneware production in West Munsterland. The workshops there had been founded by potters from Frechen who had emigrated. Other common Frechener firing aids were preformed small balls of clay. The so-called bums were put in eyelets or between two vessels for the fire.
Production sites
In addition to the well-known workshops in the pottery district of Frechen, the master potter Joost Loosen produced stoneware that can be assigned to Frechen stoneware on the Heilig-Geist-Gut near Benzelrath . The place was lost when the Frechen opencast mine was dismantled .
Museums and collections
The pottery products from Frechen form a focus in the permanent exhibition of the Keramion ceramics museum . In addition to numerous exhibits from its own holdings, the museum shows vessels owned by the city of Frechen. Further important collections of historical Frechen stoneware can be found in the Cologne Museum of Applied Arts (MAKK) and in the Hetjens Museum in Düsseldorf .
Remarks
- ^ John G. Hurst, David S. Neal, HJE van Beuningen: Pottery produced and traded in north - west Europe 1350 - 1650. Rotterdam Papers VI. A contribution to medieval archeology. The Hague 1986. p. 214.
- ^ Theodor Ostermann: Chronicle of the city of Frechen. Frechen 1967 (reprint 2000). P. 41. ( Digitized version ( memento of the original from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. )
- ↑ Manfred Rech: Frechener ceramics in the 16th and 17th centuries. Bonner Jahrbücher 190, 1990. P. 343 Nos. 24 and 25: Brenn Aids, gef. south furnace 2.
- ↑ Göbels 1971. Fig. Pp. 131-133.
- ^ Wilhelm Elling: stoneware pottery in Stadtlohn and Vreden. In: Wingolf Lehnemann (Ed.): Pottery in Northwest Germany. Contributions to folk culture in north-west Germany, 2nd edition 1980. pp. 125–216. Firing aids: p. 159 Fig. 27.
- ↑ Göbels 1971. Fig. P. 103.
- ^ Reineking von Bock 1986. p. 60.
literature
- Otto von Falke : The Rhenish stoneware. 2 volumes. Berlin 1908.
- Karl Koetschau : Rhenish stoneware. Munich 1924.
- David RM Gaimster: German Stoneware, 1200-1900: Archeology and Cultural History. British Museum Press, London 1997.
- Karl Göbels: Rhenish pottery craft. Shown using the example of the Frechen jug, Düppen and pipe bakers. Rheinland-Verlag, Cologne 1971.
- Gisela Reineking von Bock: stoneware. Decorative Arts Museum of the City of Cologne. Cologne 1986.
- KERAMION Foundation (ed.): Frechener Bartmannkrugt. Frechen 2006. ISBN 3-9810415-3-4
- 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
