DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9804#0086
60 THE BUILDING OF THE PALACES
bowls and tea-cups " 1 take us clear away from the
region of what is merely primitive or curious, and show
us what in any age would be considered beautiful.
The extraordinary thinness of the walls of these
vases, which reminds us of the finest china, or even
of Venetian glass, suggests that they were copied from
beaten originals of bronze or silver. Some of them
have elements in their designs stamped out into low
relief to represent the repousse ornament natural to such
metal-work.2 The colour effects, too, are so managed
that they repeat the high points of light of their metal
originals. The pigments used are rich and varied, and
each colour is found in many tones. Black shades into
purple, white into cream ; brown has sometimes a red
and sometimes an olive tint ; yellows are either pale or
orange ; and red is not only a crude vermilion, but is
weakened to pink, or strengthened with shades of orange
and cherry and terracotta. Light and dark grounds are
used indiscriminately, and indeed there is such a blending
of the two styles that on some of the vases it would be
difficult to say whether the design was light on dark, or
dark on light.
In regard to the designs themselves there is less to say ;
they are subordinate, as in some of the best mediaeval
stained glass windows, to the general desire to produce
a rich and harmonious colour effect. Patterns are largely
geometric, with zig-zags, crosses, spirals, and concentric
semicircles ; while large surfaces are covered with the
plain dot, used with extraordinary skill. Designs from
plant life are rare, and where they occur they are highly
conventionalised. Art can hardly be for the first time
coming into contact with nature, but is reacting in a
1 B.S.A. viii., 1901-2, figs. 70, 71, p. 120. See also the
beautiful reproductions in colour in J.H.S. xxiii. Plates V. and
VI. and ibid. xxvi. Plate VIII.
* B.S.A. viii. p. 118 ; Hogarth and Welch in J.H.S. xxi. pp.
81-3 ; Mackenzie in ibid, xxiii. pp. 172-4, xxvi. pp. 254-7.
bowls and tea-cups " 1 take us clear away from the
region of what is merely primitive or curious, and show
us what in any age would be considered beautiful.
The extraordinary thinness of the walls of these
vases, which reminds us of the finest china, or even
of Venetian glass, suggests that they were copied from
beaten originals of bronze or silver. Some of them
have elements in their designs stamped out into low
relief to represent the repousse ornament natural to such
metal-work.2 The colour effects, too, are so managed
that they repeat the high points of light of their metal
originals. The pigments used are rich and varied, and
each colour is found in many tones. Black shades into
purple, white into cream ; brown has sometimes a red
and sometimes an olive tint ; yellows are either pale or
orange ; and red is not only a crude vermilion, but is
weakened to pink, or strengthened with shades of orange
and cherry and terracotta. Light and dark grounds are
used indiscriminately, and indeed there is such a blending
of the two styles that on some of the vases it would be
difficult to say whether the design was light on dark, or
dark on light.
In regard to the designs themselves there is less to say ;
they are subordinate, as in some of the best mediaeval
stained glass windows, to the general desire to produce
a rich and harmonious colour effect. Patterns are largely
geometric, with zig-zags, crosses, spirals, and concentric
semicircles ; while large surfaces are covered with the
plain dot, used with extraordinary skill. Designs from
plant life are rare, and where they occur they are highly
conventionalised. Art can hardly be for the first time
coming into contact with nature, but is reacting in a
1 B.S.A. viii., 1901-2, figs. 70, 71, p. 120. See also the
beautiful reproductions in colour in J.H.S. xxiii. Plates V. and
VI. and ibid. xxvi. Plate VIII.
* B.S.A. viii. p. 118 ; Hogarth and Welch in J.H.S. xxi. pp.
81-3 ; Mackenzie in ibid, xxiii. pp. 172-4, xxvi. pp. 254-7.