The trouble with attaching any place to the production of a particular form of glass made in the 17th and 18thc centuries is wide spread,the problem being that many like opaque twists, air twists and many of the other popular designs were made all over the country , some say that opaque twists with bucket bowls may have been made in Bristol , why?? some bucket bowled opaque twists are found engraved with Privateer ships and captains names which operated out of bristol,but this is not 100% proof,glass was a countrywide huge business and new ideas re shapes forms etc when found to be popular with the buying public were soon adopted all over , in the early years of the balusters it it said that the finest glass probably came from the London glass houses ,London being at the forefront of innovation, but as with ceramics,pottery and furniture the ideas soon travelled to the provinces,there are some loud voices now expressing the opinion that 'Newcastle' Light balusters were NOT made in Newcastle but are all continental,I do agree that some light Balusters were made in other countries ,Holland being the main candidate,but I also believe they are stylistically different in subtle ways,and the Dutch dealers and scholars I know agree,this alone could develop into a very long discussion !!!!!
unfortunately unlike the 19thc and onwards pattern books(Greens pattern books for Venetian imports in the late 17thc being the exception) did not seem to be kept by drinking glass makers so very few of the huge variety of late 17th and 18th glass from the Golden Age of English glass making can be attributed with any certainty to a particular glass house,only when archaeological evidence is found on glass house sites is a tentative attribution possible ,the problem being there was a huge trade in Cullet,many many poorer families feeding themselves by collecting up all the broken glasses they could find and weighing them in at the local glass house for cash,lead cullet attracted a lower tax than the ingredients for new lead glass ,(or something like that) ,so a fragment of a particular stem form or bowl form found at a dig could have arrived there as cullet,the original object could have been made elsewere,in the 18thc there were many hundreds of glass houses all over the country,I remember reading that from tax records of 18thc glass houses,who were taxed by the weight of glass they sold, probably produced in excess of 10 million items in all kinds of glass in 1 year,for home and export ,so 100yrs 1680 to 1780 the Golden age ,thats a lot of glass.
Members of the Glass Association will soon be able to read in the next 'Cone', research done by Colin Brain on Johan Formica,and believes the evidence found for a glass with a particular stem form , my 'Dublin' glass ,is pretty sound ,mine being 1 of the only 2 whole examples known to date.
I know of several Lynn collectors who live in the area and to date nothing concrete has appeared so maybe old Albert knew something we never will.
Paul ,
I think you will find that serving and drinking mead by the 1/2 gallon was quite rare,the glasses you refer to I know well and have 1 here somewere , they too have encurved cup bowls ,many are plain though some are gadrooned with Baluster/Balustroid type stem ,around 5 to 5 1/2 ins tall they were for as long as I remember referred to as mead glasses then somebody thought they could have been for champagne so they became mead/champagnes, but now Dwight lanmon in his new book suggests as the form of bowl seems to match up nicely to continental wines of the same period that were known to have been used for white wine , meads are now white wine glasses , I am not convinced!!
and from 1 Scot to another I do enjoy a good wibble but prefer a wee tipple lol .
Cheers ,
Peter.
ps photo of Mead/Champagne/white wine !!!!
Topic: Ex A C Hubbard Jr Collection (Read 4428 times)
