tile
- Museum number
- 1980,0307.28
- Description
-
Plastic clay tile, solid red body, inlaid with white and glazed with yellow (now worn), featuring a knight on horseback after medieval examples from the Temple Church. On reverse, no maker's mark, but random holes punched, each ringed by a circle.
- Production date
- 1845-1860 (circa)
- Dimensions
-
Length: 14.50 centimetres
-
Width: 14.50 centimetres
- Curator's comments
- Minton & Co.'s first major commission was for the restoration of the Temple Church in 1840-42, under L. Cottingham. Some of the designs of the tiles produced by Minton are copies of medieval tiles from Westminster Abbey Chapter House which had recently been rediscovered; others were copied from the medieval tiles in the Temple Church itself and some were new designs, i.e. the symbols of the Inner and Middle Temples.
The earliest Minton tiles are two-colour inlaid tiles characterised by random stabmarks (a device which aids drying found on the reverse) together with the yellow glaze covering the inlaid white or buff areas. After about 1850 they can be identified by a full factory backstamp. Prior to this, Henry Cole tried to persuade Minton to put his name on his wares in 1846 but Minton was unwilling to offend the retailers. By 1862 or 1867, the wares were marked.
This tile was probably removed from the Temple Church after bomb damage during the Second World War. For an illustration of the tile, see Austwick 1980, no. 104. For the medieval source for this tile, see Eames 1980, vol. 2, design no. 1366.
See also, C. Johns, 'Horses: History, Myth, Art', British Museum 2006, p. 97.
See Fired Earth 1991, no.141 for a comparative example from a private collection.
- Location
- On display (G47/dc10)
- Acquisition date
- 1980
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1980,0307.28
