Types of Shell-Edged Pearlware Found at the Wentworth House

Of the hundreds of sherds of pearlware found at the Wentworth House site, a fraction of them are shell-edged, either blue or green, from different dates of manufacture. Shell-edge decoration was originally applied on creamware, but when Josiah Wedgwood developed pearlware in 1779, shell-edged pearlware soon became extremely popular. 

Pearlware was created to find a whiter color for dishes rather than creamware which, as its name suggests, is more cream colored rather than white. The way pearlware was made was by making normal creamware but including Chinese clay. Wedgwood also put a glaze on it that contains a little bit of cobalt, a silvery-blue metal to try and make the yellowish shade given by the lead glaze whiter. When ground finely it can make the ceramic more white, but when it is not ground enough it can appear as small blue dots or splotches in the ceramic, and the blue also can pool around rims and edges. These features can give clear evidence to what a ceramic sherd is made of, and thus date it. 

different types of shell-edge decoration from the Wentworth House excavations

Shell-edge decoration was applied to the pearlware at the beginning by paintbrush, with the painter dragging the brush toward the edge of the pearlware, while later the brush was dragged along the side of the ceramic, giving a distinct line on the rim of the pearlware. 

We found multiple types of shell-edged pearlware at this site. Two of the biggest pieces we found are some of the oldest, being Rococo; these shell-edges are asymmetrical with a scalloped rim. This type was commonly made between 1775 and 1800, but was still produced until 1810. We have one plate that has this green Rococo inspired, the rim is around 50% complete with many being found but unable to mend completely. The other larger piece is blue, although we have much less of the plate than the green. After Rococo we found some Neo Classical inspired shell edges in both green and blue respectively. These still have a scalloped rim but the designs on the rim are usually small vertical lines. These were made from around the 1800s to the 1830s. We found smaller pieces of these but we can still identify them as pieces of plates as shell-edge was by far the most common on plates. We also found two pieces of embossed rim, which was made from around the 1820s to the 1830s. These two pieces fit together to show a floral pattern colored in blue and do have a scalloped rim. The latest pieces of shell-edge we found were unscalloped edge ware, this kind had a totally round rim with a repeating pattern, usually of thin lines. These were made from the 1840s to the 1860s and are the most modern type of shell edge we have found. It is impressive that the most complete plate we have of shell-edge and pearlware in general is one from the first generation of shell-edged pearlware. Blue was also the most common, while green isn't too rare either. Red is very difficult to find which checks out as we found none at this site.