- Museum number
- 1981,1002.12
- Description
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Stoneware baluster jug 'Doppelfrieskanne'; turned base; strap handle; brown wash; lustrous salt-glaze; pewter lid-mount; underside - stamped bust of bishop; neck frieze - narrative scenes, peasants behind hedge, peasants' brawl, peasants' feast; body frieze - 2 musicians, nine couples dancing, respective names inscribed; above and below frieze - horizontal inscribed scrolls, much worn; monogram.
- Production date
- 1576 (on applied body-frieze)
- Dimensions
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Diameter: 94 millimetres (base)
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Diameter: 73 millimetres (rim)
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Height: 228 millimetres (max)
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- Curator's comments
- Gaimster 1997
Jug
Applied body-frieze moulded with the date 1576 and the ‘IE’ monogram of the potter Jan Emens
Baluster jug with strap handle and turned base; the rim with a flat pewter lid (the underside stamped with the bust of a bishop and the initials ‘IF-DI’). Dark grey stoneware, the surface with a dark brown wash under a lustrous salt-glaze.
Applied in low relief around the neck with a frieze (signed ‘IE’ and dated 1576) containing a series of peasant scenes accompanied by narrative text: the lovers behind a hedge ‘DU MACHST ES GAR ZU GROF 1576’ (‘You are disgusting’) and ‘ICH WIL AUCH MIT DOEN’ (‘I want you’) a brawl ‘HAVST DV MICH SO STECH ICH DICH’ (Touch me, and I will run you though’), and a peasants’ feast ‘ALDER DV MVS DANCEN’ (Let’s dance, old man’).
Applied around the body with a moulded frieze depicting nine pairs of dancers accompanied by musicians; names of dancers applied immediately above the heads of each pair: ‘IAN RONT HOOT, CLAES SAECHTISIN, HANNE EN LISE, PAES VAN STEIN, IAN TRECT SAECHT, PEER WVET, LIPPEN LOER, DORSSCHER IAM, TIS GORIS’. Above and below the figures a long illegible inscription, partly repeating the dancers’ names, applied in four narrow strips. The date 1576 and the potter’s monogram ‘IE’ visible in the centre of the frieze.
H: 228 mm
BIBL: Gaimster, D. R. M. 1995a, ‘Stoneware jug, applied in relief with scenes after Sebald Beham, 1576’, in G. Bartrum, German Renaissance Prints 1450-1550, British Museum, London, cat. 124.
LIT: Hellebrandt, H. 1977, ‘Raerener Steinzeug’, in Steinzeug aus dem Raerener und Aachener Raum, Aachener Beiträge für Baugeschichte und Heimatkunst, 4, Aachener Geschichtsverein, Aachen, 9-171, (46-51); and Kohnemann, M. 1992, Raerens Töpferfamilie Menneken, Forschungsstelle für Raerener Geschichte, Raeren, 35-6, for information on the potter Jan Emens; Kohnemann, M. 1994, Raerener Bauerntänze, V.o.G. Töpfereimuseum Raeren, Raeren for a detailed study of the Bauerntanz frieze on Raeren stoneware.
COMP: Von Falke, O. 1908, Das Rheinische Steinzeug (2 volumes), Berlin (reprint Osnabrück 1997), II, fig. 158, for jug with identical neck-frieze; von Falke 1908, II, fig. 156 ; and Reineking-von Bock, G. 1986, Steinzeug, Kataloge des Kunstgewerbemuseums Köln IV, Cologne, 3rd edition; 1st edition 1971, cat. 360, for a jug with a very similar body-frieze, only with additional scrolled ribbon border above and below figures (Kohnemann, M. 1982, Auflagen auf Raerener Steinzeug. Ein Bildwerk, Töpfereimuseum, Raeren, type 3 frieze [?]).
The two friezes are moulded in reverse after scenes in Sebald Beham’s series of engravings entitled ‘Das Bauernfest’ (‘The peasants festival’) published in Nuremburg in 1546/7 (see Ill. B: The Illustrated Bartsch, New York, 1978-(W. Smith, ed. Until 1988; J. T. Spike, ed. From 1988) B.161-3; Figs 92a-f). The scenes correspond closely to the original Beham engravings, although only nine out of twelve dancing couples are shown in the body-frieze and in random sequence (i.e. Ill. Bartsch B.158-9, 156-7, 154, 160).
Equally inconsistent are the names of the dancers, which were originally so named after the twelve months of the year (Kohnemann, M. 1994, Raerener Bauerntänze, V.o.G. Töpfereimuseum Raeren, Raeren, 7, for complete list). Here, they are replaced by names which, according to von Falke (von Falke, O. 1908, Das Rheinische Steinzeug (2 volumes), Berlin (reprint Osnabrück 1997), II, 19), may relate to actual locations or, according to Kohnemann (1994, 47), to persons from Raeren or elsewhere known to the potter.
- Location
- On display (G46/dc5)
- Exhibition history
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Exhibited:
1995 Jun-Oct, BM, 'German Renaissance Prints, 1490-1550', no.105
- Condition
- Some restoration on lower body; cracks towards base.
- Acquisition date
- 1981
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1981,1002.12
- Additional IDs
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Miscellaneous number: No 262 (Thomas Collection)
