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pottery wheels
Early medieval jugs were often hand-made, as at Lyveden and Ham Green. Coiling, coil-and-throw or beating techniques were common. Pottery was usually finished at the neck or rim on a slow wheel or turntable. Almost nothing is known about medieval pottery wheels even though most medieval jugs were thrown on a fast wheel. No actual wheels or contemporary documents concerning their construction have survived. A handful of illustrations, usually of much later date, provide some suggestive clues, although they may mislead by restricting examples to a few specific types. Locally contrived wheels of simple and robust construction are likely to have been the rule. In the hands of an experienced potter relatively simple wheels can produce fine pottery. What matters most is the skill of the potter in manipulating the particular sort of wheel being used rather than the design and construction of the wheel itself.
basic throwing methods
The fundamentals of pottery throwing probably have not changed greatly over the centuries. There are three basic methods.
Pottery can be thrown from a ball of clay placed on the centre of the wheel head and then centered to a perfectly symmetrical lump before throwing into shape. This is probably the most common method of throwing. Alternatively, the clay may be centered on a 'bat', a removable wheel head which enables the thrown pot to be removed from the wheel for drying and perhaps subsequent replacement for trimming and turning.
Vessels can be thrown 'from the lump'. A large cone of clay is centered on the wheel and clay is drawn-up from the cone to form successive individual pots which are then cut off the lump. This method allows the rapid production of small pieces but is less satisfactory for making large jugs.
'Coil and throw' techniques can be used for very large jugs, jars and containers. The bottom of the vessel is beaten-out on the wheel head and the position of the lower walls formed by a large circular sausage of clay, which is then thrown up as far as it will go.A second clay sausage is added, thumbed down onto the walls and then thrown up as before, until the desired height is reached or a further sausage applied. Pots made in this way are a mixture of hand forming and throwing. Modern production is pretty much restricted to the manufacture of large garden ornaments.
basic stages in throwing
1. Centre ball of clay on the wheel head or bat
2. Pull up the clay cylinder and form interior bottom of vessel.
3. Shape and thin the cylinder, forming belly and neck of jug and rim.
4. Finish on-wheel trimming or turning, mainly on the lower walls and around the base; add any wheel-made decoration.
5. Remove pot from the wheel head.
tools
The throwing rib is an indispensable potter's tool. Usually a smooth flat piece of hardwood fitting in the hand with one curved and one straight edge, both sharply finished. It is used, along with the fingers and knuckle, to pull-up clay when forming the cylinder, for trimming, smoothing and much else besides. When sharpened it is an effective tool for turning the pot (see below).
A sponge, sheep's wool wadding or a bit of rag can be helpful in removing collected water inside the thrown vessel. A knife or cord made of gut may be needed to remove vessels from the wheel head. There is no limit to the ad hoc small tools which individual potters may find useful. It is sometimes remarked that templates must figure among them, to be used in forming rims in repetition throwing. This is unlikely to be so in ordinary potting unless it records the practised use of a rib; simple and complex rim forms can almost always be formed and duplicated with accuracy by the fingers alone, and by a little trimming with a rib.
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turning
Turning is a lathe-like operation in which clay is cut away from the moving surface of a vessel on the wheel by using a hand-held tool. The purpose of 'turning' is principally to reduce the thickness of the walls of the pot and only secondarily to alter its shape. The nature of the turning tool itself is somewhat speculative: no iron tools, as used in modern potteries, have been found, but either a hardwood rib or a sharp piece of broken pottery would do. Evidence that either object was used for this purpose is unlikely to appear in excavation. The main indication of the use of a turning tool is found on the pottery itself. This occurs in faint grooves left by the tool on the external surface, which may be visible even beneath a clay slip covering. They differ in appearance and sometimes in direction from common throwing lines. A thoroughly turned pot may successfully erase all turning and throwing lines and leave exposed only a uniform, smooth surface over most of the vessel.
'Turning' on medieval jugs
For the most part 'turning' on medieval jugs seems to have been done with the vessel on the wheel immediately after throwing. There is evidence suggesting that, in some cases to achieve thin walls, the newly-thrown pot was removed from the wheel, dried sufficiently to allow it to be thinned again, and then replaced on the wheel for further turning. Off-centre turning is an indicator of this practice. Another less conspicuous indication of replacement is the occurrence of a thicker band of clay around the lower circumference of the base, marking the position where clay chocks were placed to stabilize the pot replaced on the wheel. Any turning will have to stop short of the chocks. The band is cut away by hand when the pot is removed, leaving a slightly uneven surface. Whether replacing a vessel on the wheel for subsequent work was a commonly done remains an open question.
Most medieval jugs appear to have been thrown normally without turning, or to have any turning restricted to an area around the lower base. 13th century Laverstock baluster jugs are good examples showing on-wheel turning and off-wheel hand work around the base, the hand trimming occasionally obliterating the basal thumbing. There may be traces of clay removal by hand inside the pottery.
Conspicuous turning on medieval pottery seems confined to particular cases where turning has a central role in the vessel's construction. For some examples:
1. Mill Green fineware jugs
These jugs are remarkable for their light weight and thin walls of great strength. They are among the few medieval jugs which are not porous, and illustrate both the manufacturing process of 'turning' and the use of underglaze slip. The main technical innovation of Mill Green fineware jugs is apparent in their surprising lightness when picked up by hand. This is achieved, in the first instance, by thinning the clay as much as possible in throwing a tapered cylinder which can tolerate a thin-walled section without collapsing; the vessel is then pulled-up, collared at the top and given a carinated neck. The top rim is formed with a brief pulled spout.
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