Exceedingly Rare and Important Three-Gallon Stoneware Jug with Profuse Cobalt Floral Decoration, Stamped "BAMA-CITY," attributed to the Augustin Mareschal (Marshall) Pottery, Fairhope or Montrose, Alabama, circa 1840, highly-ovoid jug with tooled spout and ribbed strap handle, brush-decorated with a flowering plant bearing three open-centered tulip blossoms, leaves, and dramatic curling trails of graduated cobalt dashes. Impressed at shoulder with "BAMA-CITY" maker's mark above a two-gallon capacity mark. According to historian Joey Brackner, pieces bearing the stamp "BAMA CITY" were produced by French-born potter, Augustin Mareschal, and his family, who arrived on the Eastern Shore of Mobile Bay between 1830 and 1840. Potted in the European stoneware tradition of their home country, the Marshalls' work differs markedly from the alkaline-glazed wares typically associated with the American South. Their jugs include distinctive features in the construction of the spout and handle, as well as the handle's placement unusually high on the spout. The extravagant cobalt brushwork on this example shares similarities with the tulip motifs of the Bell family in Virginia, Ohio potters, and various others. Among the most important examples of signed Southern stoneware that we have offered in recent years, this work is noteworthy for its early period of manufacture, high decorative quality, and extreme rarity. Literature: The Marshall Pottery is discussed in Brackner, Alabama Folk Pottery, pp. 78-79, with illustration of a related marked jug on pg. 79. A color plate of the same jug is illustrated on pg. 71. Excellent, essentially as-made condition with a minor in-the-firing fissure at base on front and two minor nicks to underside at edge, both possibly in-the-firing. H 14 1/2".
