Extremely Rare Three-Gallon Stoneware Jar with Large Cobalt Decoration of a Horse and Rider, possibly Brotherton Pottery, Baltimore, MD origin, circa 1830, ovoid jar with footed base, tooled shoulder, squared rim, and ribbed lug handles, decorated with a large brushed design of a top-hatted man with raised riding crop, riding atop a horse with reins and saddle. Reverse with brushed horizontal tulip motif. Cobalt highlights to handle terminals and leaf-like brushwork under one handle. The only depiction of a horse-with-rider that we have seen produced south of the Mason-Dixon Line, this design has an appealing folk art quality in its stylized rendering and is drawn in an exceptionally large size, roughly 10 1/2" horizontally around the curve of the vessel and 8" tall. Its capacity mark and form suggest it was made at the pottery of T.W. Brotherton or one of his partnerships with Justus Morton or George Henry Davidson. Professional restoration to areas of bottom half of front of jar, not touching the cobalt. Some professional restoration to rim on right side of jar's front. A professionally-restored crack descending from rim on reverse to base, part of which also curves onto front. Two chips to one handle. A 1 1/2" rim chip on reverse and small rim chip on reverse. Faint hairlines to underside. Surface lines to interior. H 13 1/2".
