"The Seventh Age" Lustreware charger

c. 1877

An English Arts and Crafts Movement lustreware charger entitled “The Seventh Age” (English, c. 1877) from the series “The Seven Ages of Man”, designed by Henry Stacy Marks (1829-1898), produced by Minton’s Art Pottery Studio. The series is based on Shakespeare's "All the World's a Stage" speech from "As You Like It" and was one of the most popular ceramics series of the 19th century. Each stage of the series represents mankind's progress from infancy to old age, this plate depicts the final stage, what Shakespeare described as the "last scene of all / that ends this strange eventful history / is the second childishness and mere oblivion / sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything." The circular charger depicts an old man seated in a garden accompanied by a woman and young child. A lawn game is scattered on the grass next to the child. The charger is inscribed on the reverse “The seventh age / Is second childishness and mere oblivion” and marked in red/purple under-glaze with a diamond date or maker’s cipher, as well as impressed with an illegible mark.

English

glazed earthenware

diameter 17"

Gift of Mrs. Charles B. Grosvenor, Jr. in memory of her mother, Mrs. Romaine Bristow Adams.

PSNC.9883