Tableware and luxury pottery

Although we also find imported pieces, the prevailing pottery in Galicia during these centuries was very homogeneous both in its making and its shape and was associated to the kitchen environment. Traces of soot are often found on the surface of pottery. The excavation mainly uncovered four types of pottery: 

Grey pottery, its name comes from its colour and dates from the 11th century. There were also some painted containers with white decoration against a red or ochre background and some imported pottery as well as some Spanish-Muslin import. The homogeneity of this type of Galician pottery began to disappear by late 13th century and early 14th century and diversified on a social, geographical and functional way.
We have also found pieces of a rough and dark appearance, where black or dark grey predominates. With time, it progressively replaced grey pottery and although similar patterns continued to be used, some elements suggest a greater variation in its production.
Approaches to earthenware by local potters. They are characterised by their hardness and texture and they have a rough throwing, irregularities on their surface, small bubbles and holes, simple finishes, devoid of any decoration where grey colours combined with ochres and yellows dominate. This type of pottery has been up until recently little known but it has become increasingly frequent in sites from the 14th and 15th centuries in the area of Santiago. They provide evidence of a technical improvement in furnaces.
Pottery made using scarcely consistent clays, with local and cheaper raw materials. It is associated to a rural or peri-urban world with little purchasing power.

© Museo das Peregrinacións de Santiago.

Late 13th century marks the start of the consumption of imported pottery in Galicia, although it cannot be ruled out that there were Spanish-Muslin pottery at an earlier time. All of them are pieces associated to the tableware trousseau, which stand out for their aesthetic quality and the abundant replicas from other regions (Catalonia, Seville and Aragon). This tableware is found in almost every site in Santiago that is connected to the areas where the the most well-off persons lived (perimeter of the Cathedral, rúa do Vilar, rúa de Acibechería...) but also at the great castles like the castle of Rocha Forte.

Amidst the remains, imported objects have been found such as jugs from Saintonge, western France, associated to the import of Bordeaux wine and which indicate a high standard of living. The first pieces that reached Galicia’s urban areas and some rural fortress came from southern England and the northeast of France and they represent a pottery with varied shapes. Mostly they consist of jugs, sometimes quite large, well cooked and with an outer green grazing, or honey-coloured or polychrome. They were usually profusely decorated with drawings and shapes that indicate a aesthetic concern that is not seen in local pottery.

By late 15th century earthenware pieces from northwest France and perhaps Rhineland began to appear. So far the presence of these pieces has only been confirmed within the urban area of Santiago and they are typically middle-sized jugs but there are also other small, very detailed containers.

The 15th century saw the apogee of Mudejar pottery in Galicia. This pottery was decorated in blue and gold at the pottery shops of Paterna and Manises. It was very well elaborated but with little variation. It essentially consists of small to middle-sized dishes, bowls and pots, the odd cup and some vessel to store spices. They are decorated with simple geometric themes but plant motifs also abound as well as some sporadic Gothic inscriptions of the Hail Mary or the anagram of IHS (Iesus Humanitas Salvador).

Tableware and luxury pottery

Grey pottery and luxury imports for the lords.

Tableware and luxury pottery

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