Lustreware: Investigating an Ancient Alchemy

The decorative ceramic style known as lustreware is a shiny metallic visual effect that flickers back and forth when light is played on it.

Lustreware was invented by a small guild of Islamic ceramicists living in the Iraqi towns of Baghdad and Basra in the 8th century AD. They used copper, silver, and lead to make the gold lights flicker on the pot surface. Naturally, they thought they were alchemists.

The history of lustreware's invention is a fascinating one of industrial espionage, nano-sized chemistry, and innovation. The recipes were mind-bogglingly complex, involving two stages of kiln firing, as well as the inclusion of copper, silver, and lead in a specific combination of paints and glazes.

In a recent set of papers appearing in the Journal of Archaeological Science, researcher Trinitat Pradell of the Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya in Spain, and several of her colleagues investigated the science behind the alchemy of lustreware. They discovered that the production of the shiny metallic gold of the Islamic potters was the result of a happy accident coupled with centuries of experimentation. Naturally, this study makes for an interesting photo essay.

The photo essay Islamic Lustreware: Origins and Techniques begins with the history of lustreware, including how there came to be Chinese craftsmen in Baghdad in the 8th century. It also discusses how cracked glazes and kaolin-clay envy gave Islamic potters the push towards the arcane chemistry that made lustreware possible. It includes some photos of pots, a glimpse of what a traditional Islamic kiln looks like as well as the experimental kiln used by Pradell and colleagues, and, most importantly, a list of museums where you can go visit lustrewares in person.

• Photo Essay: Islamic Lustreware: Origins and Techniques
• Lustreware: Timeline and History