Ceramic fragment with decorative drippings

This fragment comes from the bottom of a bowl that had convex, round sides, turned slightly outwards at the rim where a cut forms a lip. Its particularity resides in its painted decorative treatment of radiated drippings, combined with spots of polychrome glaze over a white slip. The motif takes up several triangular-shaped registers of drippings that alternate between brown, green and yellow ochre; occasionally the compartments are outlined in brown. These colours begin at the top to meet again at the bottom of the bowl, or to attach themselves to a particular motif, as we see in many Iranian ceramics. The three first lines are formed of spots or little tufts, followed by a linear succession of long ribbons. The glazing on this bowl has altered in places over time.  

At first sight, we might think the potter had been careless in the application of the decoration, but the existence of other similar pieces, both of Iranian and Fatimid origin, testify to a well-studied, sought-after effect of spots and drippings, which are present on other monochrome and greenish fragments of lusterware from Qal‘a. The style is quite common in certain regions of the Muslim world and particularly in Iran and Mesopotamia. Many such examples dating from the 9th and 10th centuries have been pointed out in Suse. There are other examples from the site of Qal‘a in conservation, sometimes in a single tint, in green or brown ochre, or in two colours, green and brown.

In Abbassid ceramic pottery, this varied chromatic decorative technique (black, brown, yellow, green) presents very freely-applied single or combined tints that form concentric spots, splatters, and long drips that radiate out from the edge. When they are combined, they create a decorative marbled effect. This decorative treatment is also present in Fayoum productions (Cairo), where the decorative style takes its cue from Abbassid productions. This was often a studied decorative effect that lasted all the way up to the 19th century on the eastern banks of Egypt. It was also present on both shores of the Mediterranean, in the north in Greece and Bulgaria and to the south in Ifriqiya (present-day Tunisia); it should be noted that some Fatimid pieces in this group are among the series of bacini in conservation in Italy.

These productions need to be studied in reference to productions from China during the Tang dynasty (618-907), where such pottery covered in drippings formed with trichromatic glazes are referred to as sançaï (three colours). Beginning in the Abbassid era, Islamic ceramics carried traces of influences from contacts with Chinese productions. Artistic creations were undoubtedly stimulated by these exchanges, the proof being in such innovations as faïence, siliceous clay, decorative drippings and, later, blue and white china or celadon imitations.

Much like the silk route, trading routes over land or by sea resulted in significant exchanges and movements in the transmission of artists and their techniques. The introduction of this decorative motif in the Maghreb clearly arose from contact with Fatimid Ifriqiya, and perhaps from the influence of foreign potters (possibly from Iran?).