Islamic pottery occupied a geographical position between Chinese ceramics, and the pottery of the Byzantine Empire and Europe. For most of the period, it made great aesthetic achievements and influence as well, influencing Byzantium and Europe. The use of drinking and eating vessels in gold and silver, the ideal in ancient Rome and Persia as well as medieval Christian societies, is prohibited by the Hadiths,Hadithic texts against gold and silver vessels with the result that pottery and glass were used for tableware by Muslim elites, as pottery (but less often glass) also was in China but was much rarer in Europe and Byzantium. In the same way, Islamic restrictions greatly discouraged figurative wall painting, encouraging the architectural use of schemes of decorative and often geometrically patterned titles, which are the most distinctive and original speciality of Islamic ceramics.
The era of Islamic pottery started around 622. From 633, Muslim armies moved rapidly towards Persia, Byzantium, Mesopotamia, Anatolia, Egypt and later al-Andalus. The early history of Islamic pottery remains somewhat obscure and speculative as little evidence has survived. Apart from tiles that escaped destruction due to their use in architectural decoration of buildings and mosques, much early medieval pottery vanished.
The Muslim world inherited significant pottery industries in Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt, North Africa (African Red Slip) and later other regions. Indeed, the origin of glazed pottery has been traced to Egypt where it was first introduced during the fourth millennium BCE. However, most of these traditions made heavy use of figurative decoration, which was greatly reduced, though not entirely removed, under Islam. Instead Islamic pottery developed geometric and plant-based decoration to a very high level and made more use of decorative schemes made up of many tiles than any previous culture.
Early Medieval (622–1200)
A distinct Muslim style in pottery was not firmly established until the 9th century in Iraq (formerly Mesopotamia), Syria and Persia. During this period pieces mainly used white tin-glaze. Information on earlier periods is very limited. This is largely due to the lack of surviving specimens in good condition which also limits the interest in the study of ceramics of these periods. Archaeological excavations carried out in Jordan uncovered only a few examples from the Umayyad period, mostly unglazed vessels from Khirbat Al-Mafjar in Palestine.Baramki, D.C., "The pottery from Khirbet El-Mefjer", The Quarterly of the Department of Antiquities in Palestine (QDAP 1942), vol. 10, pp.65-103Sauer, J.A., "Umayyad pottery from sites in East Jordan2, Jordan, Vol.4, 1975, pp.25-32. In the East, evidence shows that a production centre was set up in Samarkand under the Samanid dynasty who ruled this region and parts of Persia between 874 and 999 A.D. The most highly regarded technique of this centre is the use of calligraphy in the decoration of vessels. East Persian pottery from the 9th to 11th centuries decorated only with highly stylised inscriptions, called "epigraphic ware", has been described as "probably the most refined and sensitive of all Persian pottery".Arts, p. 223. see nos. 278-290
Chinese influence
During the Abbasid dynasty pottery production gained momentum, largely using tin glazes mostly in the form of opaque white glaze. Some historians, such as Arthur Lane, attribute the rise of such industry to Chinese influence. Evidence from Muslim manuscripts, such as Akhbar al-Sin wa al-Hind (circa 851) and Ibn Kurdadhbih's Book of Roads and Provinces (846-885), suggest that trade with China was firmly established. Lane also referred to the passage in a work written by Muhammad ibn al-Husayn al-Baihaki, (circa 1059) where he stated that the governor of Khurasan, ‘Ali ibn ‘Isa, sent as a present to the Caliph Harun al-Rashid (786-809), “twenty pieces of Chinese Imperial porcelain (Chini faghfuri), the like of which had never been seen at a Caliph’s court before, in addition to 2,000 other pieces of porcelain”.
According to Lane, the influence of Chinese pottery progressed in three main phases. The first contact with China took place in 751 when the Arabs defeated the Chinese at the Battle of Talas. It has been argued that imprisoned Chinese potters and paper makers could have taught the Muslims the art of pottery and paper-making. In the 800s Chinese stoneware and porcelain reached the Abbasids. The second phase took place in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, a period noted for the decline of pottery industry following the fall of the Seljuk dynasty. This period also saw the invasion of the Mongols who brought Chinese pottery traditions.
The influence of ceramics from the Tang dynasty can be seen on lustrewares, produced by Mesopotamian potters, and on some early white wares excavated at Samarra (in modern-day Iraq). Ceramics from this period were excavated at Nishapur (in modern-day Iran) and Samarkand (in modern-day Uzbekistan).
By the time of the Mongol invasion of China a considerable export trade westwards to the Islamic world was established, and Islamic attempts to imitate Chinese porcelain in their own fritware bodies had begun in the 12th century. These were less successful than those of Korean pottery, but eventually were able to provide attractive local competition to Chinese imports.Vainker, Ch. 5, pp. 134, 140–141 especially Chinese production could adapt to the preferences of foreign markets; larger celadon dishes than the Chinese market wanted were favoured for serving princely banquets in the Middle East. Celadon wares were believed there to have the ability to detect poison, by sweating or breaking.Vainker, 136-137
The Islamic market was apparently especially important in the early years of Chinese blue and white porcelain, which appears to have been mainly exported until the Ming. Again, large dishes were an export style, and the densely painted decoration of Yuan blue and white borrowed heavily from the arabesques and plant scrolls of Islamic decoration, probably mostly taking the style from metalwork examples, which also provided shapes for some vessels. This style of ornament was then confined to blue and white, and is not found in the red and white painted wares then preferred by the Chinese themselves. The cobalt blue that was used was itself imported from Persia, and the export trade in porcelain was handled by colonies of Muslim merchants in Quanzhou, convenient for the huge Jingdezhen potteries, and other ports to the south.Vainker, 137-140
The start of the Ming dynasty was quickly followed by a decree of 1368, forbidding trade with foreign countries. This was not entirely successful, and had to be repeated several times, and the giving of lavish imperial diplomatic gifts continued, concentrating on silk and porcelain (19,000 pieces of porcelain in 1383), but it severely set back the export trade. The policy was relaxed under the next emperor after 1403, but had by then greatly stimulated the production of pottery emulating Chinese styles in the Islamic world itself, which was by now reaching a high level of quality in several countries (high enough to fool contemporary Europeans in many cases).Vainker, 140–142
Often Islamic production imitated not the latest Chinese styles, but those of the late Yuan and early Ming.Vainker, 140-141 In turn, Chinese potters began in the early 16th century to produce some items in overtly Islamic styles, including jumbled inscriptions in Arabic. These appear to have been made for the growing Chinese Muslim market, and probably those at court wishing to keep up with the Zhengde Emperor's (r. 1505–1521) flirtation with Islam.Vainker, 142–143
Islamic innovations
From between the eighth and eighteenth centuries, the use of glazed ceramics was prevalent in Islamic art, usually assuming the form of elaborate pottery.Mason (1995) p.1 Tin-opacified glazing, for the production of tin-glazed pottery, was one of the earliest new technologies developed by the Islamic potters. Robert B. Mason notes, though, that petrograph analysis revealed some "tin-glazed" pottery to contain quarts and feldspar to attain opacity. The first Islamic opaque glazes can be found as blue-painted ware in Basra, dating to around the 8th century. Another significant contribution was the development of stoneware originating in 9th-century Iraq.Mason (1995) p.5 It was a vitreous or semivitreous ceramic ware of fine texture, made primarily from non-refactory fire clay.Standard Terminology Of Ceramic Whiteware and Related Products. ASTM Standard C242. Other centres for innovative pottery in the Islamic world included Fustat (from 975 to 1075), Damascus (from 1100 to around 1600) and Tabriz (from 1470 to 1550).Mason (1995) p.7
Lusterware was produced in Mesopotamia in the 9th century; the technique soon became popular in Persia and Syria.Ten thousand years of pottery, Emmanuel Cooper, University of Pennsylvania Press, 4th ed., 2000, , pp. 86–88. Lusterware was later produced in Egypt during the Fatimid caliphate in the 10th-12th centuries. While some production of lustreware continued in the Middle East, it spread to Europe—first in the Hispano-Moresque ware of Al-Andalus, notably at Málaga, and then Valencia, then later to Italy, where it was used to enhance maiolica.
Another innovation was the albarello, a type of maiolica earthenware jar originally designed to hold apothecaries' ointments and dry drugs. The development of this type of pharmacy jar had its roots in the Islamic Middle East. Brought to Italy from Spain, the earliest Italian examples were produced in Florence in the 15th century.
Fritware refers to a type of pottery which was first developed in the Near East, where production is dated to the late first millennium AD through the second millennium AD. Frit was a significant ingredient. A recipe for “fritware” dating to c. 1300 AD written by Abu’l Qasim reports that the ratio of quartz to “frit-glass” to white clay is 10:1:1.A.K. Bernsted 2003, Early Islamic Pottery: Materials and Techniques, London: Archetype Publications Ltd., 25; R.B. Mason and M.S. Tite 1994, The Beginnings of Islamic Stonepaste Technology, Archaeometry 36.1: 77 This type of pottery has also been referred to as “stoneware" and “faience” among other names.Mason and Tite 1994, 77. A ninth-century corpus of “proto-stoneware” from Baghdad has “relict glass fragments” in its fabric.Mason and Tite 1994, 79-80. The glass is alkali-lime-lead-silica and, when the paste was fired or cooled, wollastonite and diopside crystals formed within the glass fragments.Mason and Tite 1994, 80. The lack of “inclusions of crushed pottery” suggests these fragments did not come from a glaze.Mason and Tite 1994, 87. The reason for their addition would be to act as a flux, and so “accelerate vitrification at a relatively low firing temperature, and thus increase the hardness and density of the [ceramic] body.”
Middle (1200–1400)
By this period the distinctive Islamic tradition of decorated wall tiles had emerged, and continued to develop together with vessel pottery in a way unique to Islamic art. In the account of Ibn Naji (circa 1016) the Caliph sent, in addition to tiles, “a man from Baghdad” to Kairouan to produce lustre tiles for the mihrab of the Great Mosque (still well preserved). Georges Marçais suggested that Iraqi potters indeed came to Kairouan. The arrival of this Baghdadi potter must have led to the establishment of a satellite centre for the production of ceramics in Kairouan, but no information has yet been developed to confirm or deny this suggestion.Marcais G., Les faiences a reflets metalliques de la grande Mosquee de Kairouan, Paris, 1928, pp.10-11