Gods with Feet of Clay

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Henry Willett was one of the founding fathers of Brighton Museum. Among the many things he gave to the Museum was a collection of popular pottery, the cups and plates and mantelpiece ornaments used by everyday people at the end of the 19th Century.

Henry Willett divided his pottery collection into 23 themes, one of which was Religion.

‘On the mantelpieces of many cottage homes …. [are figures] which the inmates admire and revere … an unconscious survival of the Lares and Penates [household gods] of the Ancients.’

Henry Willett

Gods and Mythology 

Scholars and artists in Renaissance Italy began the rediscovery of Classical Greece and Rome. Of course they had never been completely forgotten; there are numerous references to Roman gods in Boccaccio’s Decameron (1350) and Chaucer borrowed many of his stories for the Canterbury Tales (1370). Saturn, Mars, Venus and Diana all figure in The Knights Tale.

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From around 1450, as more people explored ancient history and literature they reacquainted themselves with the mythology of Antiquity.

These pieces inspired contemporary painters and sculptors and engravers, who copied them or used their poses and draperies for other subjects. There is a lead figure of Neptune in Bristol, based on a classical model, dating from the 16th century. Many classically-inspired lead statues were made in the 17th century and installed in gardens and parks. Classical figures were also carved in marble for country houses or civic and church monuments. The general population became familiar with them when they appeared in public spaces.

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By the 18th century most educated middle and upper-class people spoke Latin and Greek and were familiar with illustrated editions of classical works such as Ovid’s History of the Gods. Many young aristocrats undertook a Grand Tour of Europe, visiting the important classical ruins and admiring the statuary. They bought volumes of engravings and souvenir statuettes in bronze, which they brought home to Britain. In Germany, from the 1740s, some of the best-known classical figures inspired innovative modellers, such as J.J. Kaendler, at the Meissen porcelain factory, outside Dresden. These Meissen figures were widely collected by the British upper classes. English porcelain factories, such as Bow, Chelsea and Derby then copied them, often casting exact replicas. In turn, the Staffordshire potters made their own copies of these figures from the English porcelain versions. They were usually issued in pairs such as Apollo and Diana or Minerva and Mars. Venus shared her favours with Neptune, Bacchus or Mars.

Elements and Allegories

Much of the ancient statuary so admired by Grand Tourists represented only minor gods and secular figures from mythology. Many of these came to be used to personify abstract concepts and moralities. Artists, and later the potters, were inspired by emblem books. The best known was the Italian, Cesare Ripa’s Iconologia (1593), first published in English with illustrations in 1644. Ripa defined Virtues, Vices, Passions, Arts, Humours, Elements and Celestial Bodies.

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These illustrated books led to the production of many sets of paintings and sculptures of figures representing the Muses, the Continents, the Senses and the Seasons as well as the Vices and Virtues. By the mid 18th century groups were being produced at the Meissen factory and before long groups of such figures became popular products of the English porcelain factories and the potteries. They looked well ranged along a mantelpiece or in a display cabinet.

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Sets of the Continents closely followed the German prototypes but the sharply defined distinctions between the British Seasons led to more original designs for these pottery figures. They are modelled either as young women or children, warmly or scantily dressed, each bearing appropriate fruit or grain.  The taste for personifying moral qualities was peculiarly British. The trio of Theological Virtues, Faith, Hope and Charity, were more popular than the Cardinal Virtues, Prudence, Temperance, Courage and Justice. More obscure virtues, such as Purity were also produced.

Britannia

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Under the Romans, Britannia was the major part of that island off the northern shores of Europe, first invaded by Julius Caesar in 55 BC. It shared a northern border with Caledonia (Scotland) and lay adjacent to Hibernia (Ireland) to the west. The emperors Claudius and Anoninus Pius issued coins adorned with a female figure labelled Britannia. It was the first personification of the British Isles, developed, ironically, to characterise a conquered country.

Britannia then lay dormant until she was reawakened by Henry Peacham in his Minerva Britanna, (1612) the first English emblem book. Here she is described,

‘With haire disheveld, and in mournfull wise

Who spurns a shippe, with scepter in her hand

Thus BRITAINEs drawen in old Antiquities’

King Charles II had her likeness cast on the humble copper farthing, minted in 1672. Based on her Roman forbear, she sits in profile on a rock, swathed in draperies, holding an olive branch in one hand and a spear and shield in the other. The shield is adorned with the crosses of St George and St Andrew. Samuel Pepys believed that her appearance was a portrait of Frances Stewart, Duchess of Richmond, one of the King’s mistresses.

James Thomson wrote his famous poem, Rule Britannia! as the finale of his masque, Alfred,  commissioned by Frederick, Prince of Wales, in 1740. It was set to music by Thomas Arne but became the prince’s funeral ode when he died suddenly in 1751. Some of the earliest English porcelain figures, issued by the Chelsea and the Girl-in-a-swing factories were of Britannia mourning the Prince. Soon afterwards, the Worcester factory used printed likenesses of Britannia to frame portraits of George III as she steadily gained popularity. Minerva had been a popular choice for early lead statues. Minerva, the Roman equivalent of the Greek Athena, was goddess of both wisdom and warfare. Eventually, as the potters transformed her into Britannia, the head of the monstrous gorgon (a gift from her protégé, Perseus) impaled on the centre of her shield, was replaced with the crosses of the Union flag.

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Britannia has appeared consistently on British coins and banknotes since the time of Charles II. Christopher Ironside, designer of the 1971 heptagonal 50 pence piece, reinstated her olive branch, lost since the Napoleonic wars. Her appearance had been very similar to that of the war-like Minerva, championed by Napoleon, who menaced Britannia from across the English Channel. It is ironic that Britannia and Marianne (the personification of France who followed Minerva) symbolised the aspirations of modern, democratic nations at a time when citizenship remained a male monopoly.

This text originally accompanied the Gods with Feet of Clay exhibition at Brighton Musem & Art Gallery.

The Vaccination Controversy — Brighton, 1871

Yet again, a news report from the past to remind us that the issues making the papers today are by no means new. On 25 May 1871, in the midst of a smallpox epidemic, the Brighton Gazette published a short article about the ‘vaccination controversy’.  ‘We find,’ it states, ‘numerous persons, moving in respectable society, fined for not having their children vaccinated…On the other hand we are assured that the visitation of small-pox in the metropolis has been greatly increased in virulence through persons being unwisely induced to avoid vaccination.’ Then as now, it seems, there were people who believed the risks of vaccination were greater than the risks of disease itself.

News story from the Brighton Gazette, 25 May 1871

[Transcription] ‘We are disposed to regard the VACCINATION CONTROVERSY as a source of much regret. We find, on the one hand, numerous persons, moving in respectable society, fined for not having their children vaccinated, and defending themselves by the assertion that vaccination is productive of disease more to be dreaded than the small-pox it is supposed to remedy. On the other hand we are assured that the visitation of small-pox in the metropolis has been greatly increased in virulence through persons being unwisely induced to avoid vaccination. In a matter of such importance it is a pity that steps are not taken by the highest authorities to arrive at suscha  decision on the subject as may satisfy the reasonable prejudices against inoculation, and remove a question so important out of the sphere of mere irresponsible pamphleteering.’

Nobody could have doubted the seriousness of smallpox – there were several epidemics in Britain during the 19^th century, and thousands of lives were lost. As a result, the smallpox jab was made compulsory in 1853 and, in 1867, further laws were passed to counter growing opposition to mandatory vaccination. There were many reasons for this resistance. Some people objected to the procedure itself or were generally wary of the medical profession. Others refused vaccination on religious grounds or argued that having it forced upon them or their children was unethical. In Leicester, where opposition was particularly strong, the vaccination programme was dropped in favour of isolating individual cases and improving hygiene and sanitation. Death rates fell significantly.

Smallpox has been eradicated in the UK and the vaccine hasn’t been used in this country since the 1970s, but debates about the safety and value of mass immunisation have not become a thing of the past. No doubt reports of today’s dilemmas will make interesting reading for historians of the future.

Kate Elms, Brighton History Centre

The Spice of Life, the story of Salt and Pepper

Geology and Biology

Spice Box, 19th century

Salt is the only edible rock, one of its many contradictions. The mineral is formed by the violent coupling of sodium, a highly volatile metal that bursts into flames on contact with water and chlorine, a poisonous green gas. Rock salt occurs as a solid deposit that can be mined, or is formed by the evaporation of seawater. Salt crystals are cubic in shape and in this crystalline form are called halite.

The globe is covered with salt. The oceans are 3.5% salt and sodium compounds comprise 2.6% of the weight of the earth’s crust, which is richly veined with seams of halite and riddled with salt-lined caverns. All life came from the sea. Even our own bodies are largely bags of brine supported by bone. Our blood, sweat, tears and semen are all salty.

Salt Mythology

Saltcellar, c1850

Early fables confirm the psychological importance of salt to ancient cultures. There are many Norse versions of ‘Why the Sea is Salt’ and a similar folktale, ‘The Magic Mill’, comes from Greece. A mysterious stranger instructs a poor man, on the road to the Dead Men’s Hall, to trade food for the hand-mill kept behind the entrance gate of the Hall (or Hell). The mill has magical properties and with it the poor man and his wife are able to grind out everything they need. The man is eventually persuaded to sell the mill to someone who does not know how to operate it. The new owner takes it to sea, commands it to grind salt and is unable to stop it.

‘Love like Salt’ probably originated in India but variants are found in Germany and England, where it became the source for Shakespeare’s King Lear. A loving daughter is disowned by her father because she says she loves him only as much as the salt in her food. Much later he is invited to a grand wedding feast where the food, prepared without salt, is bland and tasteless. The king realises his mistake and the bride reveals herself to be his estranged daughter.

Salt as Symbol

Spicebox c1900

Salt has powerful symbolic meanings all over the world. In Japanese Shinto belief it is revered for its power to cleanse and purify. It is scattered on thresholds to ward off evil and offered in tribute to ancestors. In Aztec Mexico the goddess Huixtocihuatl presided over salt and salt water. The God of Israel’s bond with the Jewish people was an eternal ‘Covenant of Salt’ (2 Chronicles 13: 5). When Christ described His Apostles as ‘the salt of the earth’ (Matthew 5: 13) he was probably alluding to their purity and strength in the face of corruption. At pre-Reformation baptisms the priest put hallowed salt into the infant’s mouth to

‘signify the spiritual salt, which is the word of God, wherewith he should be
seasoned and powdered that thereby the filthy savour of stinking sin should
be taken away’.

In ancient Greece, in Russia and still throughout the Arab world salt represents friendship and hospitality; the communal eating of bread and salt creates an unbreakable bond. The Bedouin will never fight someone with whom they have shared salt. The spilling of salt is a bad omen. In his painting of The Last Supper Leonardo da Vinci shows Judas Iscariot upsetting a saltcellar. After spilling salt we throw a pinch over our left shoulders to ward off evil. An Indian myth suggests that every grain a woman spills during her lifetime must be swept up with her eyelashes in Paradise.

Salt and Geography

The quest for salt is primal. Carnivores obtain it from the meat they eat but herbivores must seek out exposed salt deposits to lick in order to maintain a dietary balance. Humans need to eat salt but we also crave more than we need, since it enhances the sense of taste. Salt has always been a sought-after commodity, mined for millennia. In 1573 a dried but well-preserved body of a man wearing brightly-coloured, woven clothes was excavated at Hallein, near Salzburg (the names mean ‘salt works’ and ‘salt town’) in Austria. The man was an Iron Age Celtic salt-miner, around 3,000 years old. The Romans referred to Celts as Galli (Gauls) from ‘hals’, the Greek word for salt. The provinces of Galicia, in both northern Spain and in Poland have the same root – land of the salt people. Elsewhere in Europe, place names such as Moselle in northeast France and Salies-de-Béarn in the southwest, Salsomaggiore in Italy and Spanish towns prefixed ‘Salinas’ commemorate their associations with salt production. Britain’s largest deposits of salt were formed beneath Cheshire 220 million years ago. The names Nantwich, Droitwich, Norwich and Sandwich denote places where salt is found.

Maracas Salt & Pepper Shakers, c2007

Salt is mined but it may also be farmed. As early as 6,000 BC the Chinese harvested the salt crystals left when the brackish waters of Lake Yungcheng in Shanxi Province evaporated in the summer sun. The ancient Egyptians made salt by evaporating seawater in the Nile delta. A salt garden is laid out as a chequerboard of wide, shallow basins on the seashore. These fill with a controlled amount of seawater that evaporates to a concentrated ‘pickle’. Evaporation needs plentiful hot sunshine; the major producers of traditional solar-dried salt are in Africa and India. The cubic crystals of common salt are produced from boiled brine.

Salt in Politics

Salt & pepper shakers, c1950

The desire for salt has been harnessed to social and political ends throughout history. A salarium was a special payment for salt made to soldiers of the Roman Empire. The term ‘salary’ is now used for all work-related payment. In 1343 the French king set up the Gabelle, a tax levied on salt traders, following Arab practice. Hugely unpopular, it was one of the causes of the French Revolution. Though briefly quashed, Napoleon revived it to pay for his campaigns and it was only finally abolished after World War II. Wars have been fought over salt and control of the salt trade regularly tipped the balance of power. The Dutch made peace with Spain in 1609 because of their dependence on coveted Spanish supplies of salt from Portugal and the Caribbean.

Under British rule India was forced to buy imported salt; making salt was illegal. In 1923, a century after the abolition of salt tax at home, Britain doubled the Indian salt tax. Mahatma Gandhi hit upon a brilliant form of peaceful protest against British rule. He and his followers set out on a three-week pilgrimage to the sea and on 6 April 1930 reached Dandi Beach in Gujarat. Having taken a ceremonial bath in the sea as a ritual cleansing, they gathered and distributed the salt incrustations free of tax, activities that were rapidly copied by others. These symbolic actions helped to hasten Indian independence.

Salt and Food

‘Sal sapit omnia’ (Salt flavours everything)

Rubik’s Cruet Salt Mill, c2008

The ancient Egyptians included salt and salt-preserved birds and fish as funerary offerings in tombs from the 3rd millennium BC. In Europe the Celts pioneered the use of salt as a preservative and were probably the first people to make salt-cured hams from the legs of wild boar. Over the barren winter period hunting was curtailed and stores of fodder were not sufficient to feed farm animals. Throughout the Middle Ages and up to the 18th century, an annual slaughter of livestock took place in late autumn. Legs of pork and venison were caked in rock salt for weeks, which both dried and preserved them, free from bacterial decay. In the days before refrigeration ocean-going fishing fleets discovered that they could preserve their catches for many weeks by salting them. The word ‘salad’ derives from the Roman custom of salting leaf vegetables.

In the Middle Ages fine table salt was expensive and always in short supply. At great feasts salt was presented in elaborate silver vessels. Later these were decorated with marine motifs or gods of the sea. These saltcellars or great ‘salts’ were placed at the top table for the host and his principal guests. Lesser mortals, who sat further away, were said to be ‘below the salt’. Since salt corrodes silver, silver salts had to be lined with non-reactive gold and were later fitted with blue glass liners. Glass and ceramics and eventually plastics proved more practical and affordable materials from which to fashion receptacles for table salt and spices.

Condiments

Chef’n g’Rabbit Salt & Pepper Mills, c2008

By the 18th century great salts had disappeared. Individual ‘trencher’ salts that sat beside each diner’s plate had already been in use for centuries. Saltcellars or shakers were joined on the dining table by pepper casters and mustard pots, often sitting together on a little tray or in a holder. Black pepper (piper nigrum) is a flowering vine native to South India. During the Middle Ages, while Italy and later Portugal controlled (and taxed) the spice trade from the Indian subcontinent, pepper was a luxury only available to the wealthy. Pepper berries are harvested when green and unripe, blanched in hot water and dried. The outer fruit shrinks, wrinkles and becomes black. White pepper is the seed of the same berry, stripped of its outer skin. Unripe green pepper berries and ripe red ones can be preserved in brine and vinegar. Different species of the mustard plant yield tiny red, black or yellow seeds. Mustard thrives in temperate countries such as England and Hungary, as well as India.

Stella Beddoe, Senior Keeper and Keeper of Decorative Art