"With Great Care": High End Porcelain on Black Beacon Hill

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Meanwhile, In the NPS Lab: Discoveries from the Collections" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

During excavations of the African Meeting House on the north slope of Boston’s famed Beacon Hill, archaeologists collected an intact, gilt decorated porcelain plate from the site’s surface. This plate, with an obscure Latin phrase and boars head emblem, seemed out of place. The maker’s mark on its base puts it further out of place, declaring the plate to have been imported by Richard Briggs, merchant to Boston’s elite. At least one other porcelain vessel found at the African Meeting House also bears Briggs’ mark, though it seems unlikely that Briggs’ Washington Street store would have permitted black customers. How did these fine European porcelains make their way from the Brahmins’ choice retailer to a community most of them ignored?

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Meanwhile, In the NPS Lab: Discoveries from the Collections   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 610