19th-century british beer mugs?

updated wed 17 sep 08

Joseph Herbert on sun 14 sep 08

Link to a picture of a British beer mug in the Victoria and Albert =
museum.

Another source would be genre painting showing tavern scenes, think =
Hogarth.

http://www.vam.ac.uk/images/image/40960-popup.html


Joe


-----Original Message-----
From: Clayart [mailto:CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG] On Behalf Of The Fuzzy =
Chef
Sent: Sunday, September 14, 2008 11:32 AM
To: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG
Subject: 19th-century british beer mugs?

Folks,

A friend has asked me to make him a beer mug for Dickens Fair. What
would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London beer
mug would have looked like?

--Josh

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The Fuzzy Chef on sun 14 sep 08

Steve Mills wrote:
> Dear FC,
>
> Traditional Beer Mug (Tankard) holds 1 UK pint, and the shape is an echo
> of the Pewter Tankard beloved of British Beer or Ale drinkers. The shape
> is commonly straight sided, and slightly narrower at the top than the
> base. This is because Traditional English Ales are still, NOT fizzy, and
> the slight taper forces a "Head" of foam to the top.
> If you like I can send you pictures.

Thanks. I was thinking more, what clay bodies and glazes would have
been used for the common cheap tankard in, say, 1885? Would your
Victorian tradesman or servant be more likely to drink from a cast
"china" mug or a hand-thrown one, or had pottery been thrown over
completely for tin?

I have sources for what ceramics in the US looked like during that
perioud, but haven't been able to find the right sources for what
British ceramics looked like during that period.

--Josh

Mary & Wes Handrow on sun 14 sep 08

First of all London by this time would have been making almost all of beer
mugs out of glass, pressed glass at that. The closest you might get to
something made of clay would have either have been slip cast to look like
some landmark or have sprigs with a coat of arms, school symbol, union jack,
ship, yada, yada, yada. You get the idea. You have to go back some ways
before the London folks would be commonly be using crockery. It's just not
like Germany with its long history of salt glazed beer steins. The British
were all about the industrial age by this time and glass was faster, easier,
and cheaper to make and sell.

-----Original Message-----
From: Clayart [mailto:CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG] On Behalf Of The Fuzzy Chef
Sent: Sunday, September 14, 2008 12:32 PM
To: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG
Subject: 19th-century british beer mugs?

Folks,

A friend has asked me to make him a beer mug for Dickens Fair. What
would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London beer
mug would have looked like?

--Josh

The Fuzzy Chef on sun 14 sep 08

Folks,

A friend has asked me to make him a beer mug for Dickens Fair. What
would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London beer
mug would have looked like?

--Josh

Steve Mills on sun 14 sep 08

Dear FC,

Traditional Beer Mug (Tankard) holds 1 UK pint, and the shape is an echo of the Pewter Tankard beloved of British Beer or Ale drinkers. The shape is commonly straight sided, and slightly narrower at the top than the base. This is because Traditional English Ales are still, NOT fizzy, and the slight taper forces a "Head" of foam to the top.
If you like I can send you pictures.

Steve
The Happy Tankard Maker & Ale Drinker
in Bath
UK

--- On Sun, 9/14/08, The Fuzzy Chef wrote:
From: The Fuzzy Chef
Subject: 19th-century british beer mugs?
To: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG
Date: Sunday, September 14, 2008, 6:32 PM

Folks,

A friend has asked me to make him a beer mug for Dickens Fair. What
would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London beer
mug would have looked like?

--Josh

Josh Berkus on mon 15 sep 08

All,

Thanks for all the advice & ideas. Time to do more research.

--
Josh "the Fuzzy" Berkus
San Francisco

Randall Moody on mon 15 sep 08

Try *www.beerstein.net/articles/bsj-1c.htm* or*
http://www.steincenter.com/stein/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=1216* but I think
you are going to find more information concerning German steins. Try doing a
google image search for "tankard" rather than "mug". I think that in England
most of the tankards of that era were pewter. I could be mistaken though.

--
Randall in Atlanta

On Sun, Sep 14, 2008 at 1:32 PM, The Fuzzy Chef wrote:

> Folks,
>
> A friend has asked me to make him a beer mug for Dickens Fair. What
> would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London beer
> mug would have looked like?
>
> --Josh
>

Frances Howard on mon 15 sep 08

Hi Josh,

19th century beer mugs in England were almost always pewter and came in all
sorts of shapes, curved, straight, plain or decorative handles etc. They
had to be made to certain measures, i.e. 1/4 pint, 1/2 pint, 1 pint, and
these were rigourously inspected by weights and measures people who would
put their stamp on the pot. This was very important and a serious error or
worse to be under or over volume. There would often be the stamp VR beside
it (Victoria Regina). Sometimes they were engraved with the owners name and
very often people frequenting a particular pub had their own tankard and
the publican would keep it hanging up on a beam and reserve it for them
alone. I have several Victorian tankards and they all have numerous
government stamps on them, pewter being soft can take impressions very
easily.

I don't think pottery mugs were much used in the 19th century if at all,
they really belong to an earlier era. Pewter by then was affordable and
there were many places where it was made. I think if you were to look up
pewter victorian beer tankards there would be hundreds of references and
pictures. If you were really rich you might have had a silver tankard. I
would think if your friend wants a Victorian mug you would have to be
careful that it holds the correct amount of liquid indicated on the side.
(Not the bottom).

Hope this helps Frances Howard NS Canada
----- Original Message -----
From: "The Fuzzy Chef"
To:
Sent: Sunday, September 14, 2008 2:32 PM
Subject: 19th-century british beer mugs?


> Folks,
>
> A friend has asked me to make him a beer mug for Dickens Fair. What
> would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London beer
> mug would have looked like?
>
> --Josh
>

Hank Murrow on mon 15 sep 08

On Sep 15, 2008, at 9:24 AM, Frances Howard wrote:
>
> I don't think pottery mugs were much used in the 19th century if at
> all,
> they really belong to an earlier era.

Dear Frances and Josh;

The Guild Hall had a wonderful collection of those earlier pottery
tankards and pitchers. These are now in the Museum of London, where a
rotating display may be seen. They are some of the gutsiest and fresh
things I have seen in any museum right up to the present. While
glazed simply( some just dusted with galena) they stand out for the
fresh and free way the potters had with the clay.

Perhaps do a google search for the museum of london and medieval
pottery.

Cheers, Hank

Lee Love on tue 16 sep 08

On Mon, Sep 15, 2008 at 4:45 PM, Hank Murrow wrote:

> Perhaps do a google search for the museum of london and medieval
> pottery.

Check this out:

http://tinyurl.com/london-ware

Some incredible pots.

--
Lee Love in Minneapolis
http://heartclay.blogspot.com/
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
http://claycraft.blogspot.com/

"Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground." --Rumi

Ivor and Olive Lewis on tue 16 sep 08

<would be a good resource for finding out what a 19th-century London
beer
mug would have looked like?

--Josh>>

Dear Josh,
London in the 19th Cent was a sophisticated place as well as having
its seamy side.

One source of illustrations of domestic ware which includes many
examples of drinking vessels would be Jeremy Haslem, "Medieval
Pottery" published by Shire Archaeology. ISBN -85263-670-9. Has an
extensive list of museums.
Yes, I know, it predates the era you are researching by half a
millennium. But one form was called the London Baluster but the
pattern reflects the design of later pewter mugs.

Best regards,
Ivor Lewis.
Redhill,
South Australia.