Introduction

The Classical Vase Transformed: Consumption, Reproduction, and Class in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Britain explores hitherto marginalized working-class and middle-class engagements with ancient Greek vases. Its origins lie in a symposium which took place in May 2016 at King’s College London, ‘Ancient Greek Pots and Class in Britain, 1798–1939’. This themed issue of BICS has three principal aims. First, to sharpen our awareness of the range of engagements with classical culture experienced at the lower end of the social spectrum, in the context of a scholarly focus on elites. Second, to help redress the balance within Classical Reception Studies, which is heavily skewed towards receptions of classical literature rather than classical material culture. And third, to increase the prominence of humble ceramics as compared to grand monumental sculpture, which remains the focus of studies on the reception of classical material culture.

The intellectual roots of the first aim, to take into account the broad range of classical experience among the working and middle classes of Britain, lie in recent developments in the Humanities, particularly the increasing focus on non-elites and marginalized groups and the writing of micro-histories. Within Classics specifically the searching out of subaltern voices and popular culture is gaining momentum, and helping to change the elitist legacy of the discipline.¹ Within Classical Reception Studies there has been a ‘democratic turn’ including a sharper focus on responses to classical culture within popular culture, and increasing recognition of the role of marginal voices in shaping the tradition.² Post-colonial theory, with its connections to critical race theory and political activism, ultimately underpins these approaches, while the history of Classics in former European colonies and amongst communities and people of colour in the past and today is a burgeoning area of critical enquiry.³ These exciting developments offer new objects of study and potentially fresh audiences to classicists.

While a small but vocal minority of classicists remain unconvinced of the value of Classical Reception Studies, seeing ‘reception’ as an extraneous layer that needs to be ‘peeled off’ in order to access the ancient world ‘directly’, the theoretical basis of Classical Reception Studies continues to be a subject of scholarly debate.⁴ This has extended to some scholars objecting to the use of the term ‘reception’ on the basis that it obscures the fluidity of classical texts and art and the contested nature of the Classics in every encounter,⁵ and to others insisting on a distinction between ‘the classical tradition’, implying a valuable fixed canon handed down, and ‘classical reception’ which emphasizes the importance of responses to the classical world, in their particular cultural and historical context.⁶ Case studies of receptions of classical literature both in modern literature and in theatrical performance have flourished in Anglophone scholarship since the 1990s; yet studies of receptions of classical material culture still lag behind.⁷ This situation gives rise to the second aim of this themed issue: to help redress the balance within Classical Reception Studies from the predominance of classical literature and concomitant marginalization of classical material culture to a more even-handed treatment. The roots of the imbalance are deep, and reach down to the origins of Classical Reception Studies in scholarship on the reception of classical texts in modern literature. They are simultaneously nurtured by the long-standing disciplinary divide in Classics between literature (Classical Philology) and material culture (Classical Archaeology). More fundamentally, there is disagreement about what ‘the reception of classical material culture’ actually means. It can be understood as the history of the scholarship of classical art and archaeology, the history of collecting, or responses to classical art in modern literature or in the visual arts. Some of these areas have a long and distinguished history of study, but within a variety of disciplines (spread between Art History, Eighteenth-Century Studies, and Classical Archaeology), with surprisingly little interaction between them. This disjunction is compounded by the fact that many archaeologists do not consider the history of archaeology to be part of their subject, whose core positivist aim is the recovery, conservation, cataloguing, and interpretation of physical data. The fact that classical art and the creative responses it has given rise to are part of our present postmodern world, and that looking at art is apparently easy and natural (as opposed to the hard-won skill of reading difficult texts in ancient Greek and Latin) further complicates the meaning, and perhaps the status, of the reception of classical material culture. It is not an exaggeration to say that the study of ‘the classical tradition’ in Art History has typically consisted of tracing and celebrating the influence of a revered classical canon. Recently readings have been more critical, and one of the most interesting developments has been an aestheticizing, anti-historicist theory which allows for influence both ways, and sees ‘the classical tradition’ as fluid and changing.⁸

The reception of classical sculpture has fared relatively well within the disciplines of Art History, Eighteenth-Century Studies, and even Classical Archaeology. Areas of particular interest are collecting and the Grand Tour, and the nationalist use of sculptural archaeological remains in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.⁹ But the reception of Greek vases, including the history of scholarship, collecting, creative responses, and influence on the production of later painting, has only recently started to be explored in depth. This state of affairs gives rise to the third aim of the issue: to put the reception of Greek vases in the spotlight in the context of the dominance of monumental stone sculpture in studies of receptions of classical material culture. What explains this dominance? Arguably it is related to their perceived value, both in monetary and artistic terms: both in antiquity and in the post-antique period Greek ceramics have been cheaper than sculpture. In a recent discussion on the classical tradition M. Silk, I. Gildenhard, and R. Barrow claim that ‘it is not just any aspect of the Graeco-Roman world that inspires and influences, but overwhelmingly the special and the privileged—Homer’s Iliad, Plato’s dialogues, the ruined glories of Phidias’ marbles’.¹⁰ It is no coincidence that the apogee of classical sculpture is mentioned here and not a ‘masterpiece’ of Greek ceramics such as the Euphronios krater. Yet the plethora of creative responses to Greek vases, which were on the whole cheap wares, is, in fact, evidence that it is not only privileged aspects of antiquity which inspire and influence. But the authors’ related point about value is relevant: not just antiquities traders but scholars from J. J. Winckelmann to J. Beazley have approached what are basically functional ceramic pots as high art in an attempt to elevate them. This has been accomplished through an extraordinary focus on their iconography at the expense of their three-dimensionality, and more specifically through comparisons with Renaissance painting and the invention of a whole genealogy and fantasy nomenclature of Athenian painters, with the effect of disguising the lowly craft origins of the pots.

To the extent that the reception of Greek vases has been explored it is through engagements of the elite: notably the history of collections, their display in elite domestic space and public museums, and the history of scholarship.¹¹ Another rich area of study is that of creations inspired by Greek vases, particularly two-dimensional images of vessels and their iconography, but also three-dimensional ceramics, furniture, tapestries, and fashion.¹² Again, such studies have focused on items created for elite consumption. The Classical Vase Transformed, then, breaks new ground in its focus on non-elite responses to Greek vases.

In Britain, education in Latin and Greek was and still is the domain of the elite. This has played a determining role in limiting access to the classical world. Classical material culture has always had the potential of bypassing the elitist linguistic gatekeeper and offering access to the classical world to people who do not know Latin and Greek. Greek vases specifically offer particularly rich possibilities for revisionist histories of engagement with classical culture for several reasons. They are connected to non-elites of ancient Greece, firstly through their cheap material and manufacture by non-elite craftsmen, whose work had a direct analogue in that of the labourers in the Potteries and other factories; secondly through their depiction of the lives of non-elite Athenians including slaves; and thirdly through their use and handling by non-elites as well as by elites.¹³ A class-focused exploration of the reception of Greek pots, then, offers the opportunity to analyse non-elite responses to ancient non-elites.

Yet, on closer analysis, any attempt to correlate non-elites in ancient Greece with those in Britain of the Enlightenment and the nineteenth century collapses because of the culturally specific nature of concepts of social status. The term ‘class’ is contested and its use is complicated. Within the discipline of Classics the debate has been dominated by the seminal works of Moses Finley and Geoffrey de Ste. Croix, the former using the concept of status, the latter advocating class as an analytical category.¹⁴ Britain of the Industrial Revolution is an entirely different landscape not least because of emerging class consciousness and self-identity. The term ‘class’ is used in the articles in this themed issue variously to denote economic and/or social status; there is no intention to suggest that this is a stable, universally applicable concept. The emphasis is not on class as an analytical category but more broadly on the ways that power dynamics, ranging from the systems of social class and gender roles to restrictive museum cabinets, affect access to classical culture and mould people’s encounters.

The seven case studies presented here are diverse and no single overarching narrative has been imposed on the material; yet this themed issue aspires to being more than the sum of its parts. Section One, ‘The Classical Vase Produced and Consumed in New Ceramic Forms’, contains four articles on aspects of British ceramics which respond to Greek vases. These articles predominantly explore production, although marketing and consumption in middle- and lower-class houses are also important themes. Edith Hall opens the issue with a broad geographical and chronological sweep, considering what knowledge of the classical world pottery workers had in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain. She argues that manual labour in the production of wares that creatively imitated Greek vases and classical art more generally gave workers a degree of access to the classical world, and she links this to evidence for the use of Classics in contemporary political activism. My own article focuses on Josiah Wedgwood’s employment of women at Etruria and marketing of wares to women c.1760–1820. It analyses the way that both social class and gender played determining roles in the kinds of engagement with Greek vases that were available at the Wedgwood manufactory and showroom. It argues for broadening the kinds of engagement with Greek vases and their imitations which we admit as valuable in the history of the reception of Greek vases to include manual labour in ceramic production, and specifically for the recognition of the work of Sarah Wedgwood and of female employees at the manufactory such as paintresses, as an important and hitherto overlooked way in which women of middle or low social class engaged with classical culture differently to upper-class women and men. Janett Morgan’s article traces the production of Lewis Llewellyn Dillwyn’s Etruscan ware in Swansea between 1847 and 1850, which imitated Greek vases and was aimed at lower-class buyers. This story of potential democratization of Greek vases emerges as one of failure and disappointment, as the wares did not sell. Morgan identifies a number of causes for this: people’s lack of familiarity with Greek vases, instantiated in the absence of publications about them in Welsh; and the inappropriateness of the wares in the specific social, religious, and spatial contexts of humble Welsh homes, including the iconography of naked bodies and the relatively dark colour schemes of the red and black on display in small, dark spaces. Paul Lewis, on the other hand, finds evidence for the success of cheaper polychrome wares from a number of factories imitating Greek vases in England c.1845–75. He traces the relationship between the dissemination of original Greek vases in cheap newspapers such as the Penny Magazine, and the appeal of imitation wares. He considers a range of users within households, including aspiring middle-class owners and their servants.

Section Two, ‘The Classical Vase Constrained in the Museum Cabinet and Transfigured in the Body’, contains three articles not on ‘ceramic’ responses to Greek vases but responses which essentially involve the body and senses in the realms of museum display and performance. Caspar Meyer’s article discusses the effects of the introduction and proliferation of glass-fronted cabinets for the display of Greek pottery in public museums in the mid-nineteenth century. This had the effect of curtailing tactile engagement with vases and prioritizing visual receptions. This in turn had a disproportionate effect on non-elite visitors who did not have the benefit of education in the Classics and in Art History. Furthermore, he argues that what was originally introduced with the intent of controlling the access of non-elite visitors to these objects, on account of their fragility and explicit iconography, ultimately became the norm for everyone, scholars and aristocrats included. Here, then, is an example of the way that the non-elite element of society was the catalyst for a profound and broad change in museum culture which still pertains today. Helen Slaney discusses Emma Hamilton and her ‘Attitudes’ in Italy in the later eighteenth century. She argues that the ‘Attitudes’ can be understood as kinaesthetic engagement with Greek vases which gave Hamilton embodied knowledge of the ancient artefacts; she contrasts this performative knowledge with the intellectual and tactile knowledge of male scholar collectors. Abigail Baker discusses the public lectures of Jane Harrison on mythology and Greek vases, that is, oral, ephemeral performances, which were aimed at middle- and working-class audiences in the British Museum and the South Kensington Museum in the 1880s and 1890s. Both A. Baker and H. Slaney put in the spotlight engagements with Greek vases which were on the fringes of the scholarly world; they search out their particularity and value; they argue for the agency of Hamilton and Harrison in their ‘performances’, moving beyond contemporary responses to performer or audience which were coloured by prejudices related to class and gender. At the same time, both consider the effects that low social origins might have had on the nature of engagements with the ancient artefacts, for Hamilton as performer and for the audience of Harrison. In the production process of this themed issue, readers noted the predominance of women, especially in the three articles by H. Slaney, A. Baker, and myself. Female experiences of Greek vases, and specifically lower-class female experiences, thus emerge as a particular area of marginalization in the period under consideration even though this was not intended at the outset.

Such non-elite classical receptions matter. Within Classical Reception Studies there is still an unspoken hierarchy of value which has silenced many non-elite encounters. So, for example, John Keats’ ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’ (1819) is deemed worthy of critical study in relation to ancient Greek art and the classical world; less so haute couture and nail art inspired by Greek vases (see fig. 1). While important distinctions of genre and even quality of such very different cultural products should not be collapsed, dismissing more popular engagements with Classics as less worthy of scholarly attention feeds into an elitist and illiberal strand in our discipline. The material discussed in this issue is little known, drawing in many cases on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century pottery collections in provincial museums and private collections, popular press illustrations, and rich archival material in the Staffordshire Potteries. It has, as yet, not been brought into dialogue with scholarship on the reception of classical art amongst the British elite. Weaving it into the developing story of the reception of Greek vases broadens the social range of objects and people we study, helping to create a more inclusive Classics discipline.

Figure 1.

Nails painted and stamped with black-figure vase motifs. Photo credit: L’Angolo degli Smalti, www.langolodeglismalti.com.

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For all their variety, the articles in this issue demonstrate two important themes: first, the nature of interactions with Greek vases and their imitations were shaped by power structures that include social status, gender, and even the materiality of vitrines in museum display; and second, that Greek vases and their imitations were consciously used to enact and embody ideas of taste allied to social identity and status. Taken as a collection, the articles increase our awareness of social power structures which have precluded or promoted access to, and participation in, classical culture. This is important for our understanding of the history of Classics; but the issue also aspires to engage with historians of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain. It argues for the recognition of diverse types of engagement with classical culture, such as those of workers in the Potteries and lower-class consumption in homes and public museums. Classical culture is thus shown to have been to some degree available much lower down the social spectrum than previously recognized. If this is the case, it changes our understanding of the place of classical culture in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain and helps us to think differently about those periods. This issue of BICS is an invitation to collaboration with cultural, social, and economic historians of the eighteenth and nineteenth century, particularly those working on the production and consumption of objects, class, and gender. And there is more than historical knowledge at stake here: fundamentally, I hope that this themed issue’s highlighting of barriers to accessing classical culture in the past and its exploration of the value of diverse types of engagement with the classical world will help to shape the discipline of Classics in a more inclusive mould in the future.

Footnotes

BIBLIOGRAPHY