Creamware teaware, possible large teabowl or slop bowl.

This fragment of cream colored ceramic is a portion of hollow teaware, possibly a large teabowl or a slop bowl. Archaeologists refer to this kind of ceramic as creamware and associate it with that produced by English potter Josiah Wedgewood beginning in 1762. Wedgewood successfully marketed this ware to a wide range of consumers. In 1767, he successfully sold a tea service to Queen Charlotte, wife of George III, and thereafter advertised the ceramic as Queen’s ware to appeal to the upper and middle class households throughout the English colonial world. George Washington himself used this term when ordering a 250-piece table setting for Mount Vernon in 1769. Wedgewood also ensured the success of creamware by pricing the ceramic reasonably, and at a substantially cheaper cost than imported Chinese porcelains. For these reasons, creamware was readily stocked in shops throughout the colonial America where it was within reach of a wide array of free and enslaved consumers who had access to these stores over the second half of the eighteenth century.

Hollowares such as this form were essential for the consumption of tea within the households of the eighteenth century. By the mid-eighteenth century and later, tea drinking was a common practice within households of both high and low social and economic statuses. Brewing, serving and drinking tea required a variety of vessel forms. Tea was served and drunk from small handleless cups called teabowls, which were of several sizes for breakfast or afternoon tea service. Slop bowls were used a receptacles for the disposal of dregs or cold tea during service. Of course, despite originating as specialized vessels for tea, such forms could have been used to serve or drink a variety of other liquids as well.

Measurements taken from largest sherd.