By about AD 1000 (in the Islamic calendar 378 AH), the lustre potters left Basra and set up workshops in Fustat, Egypt, under the rule of the Fatimids. Fatimid dynasty lustres brought a new level of diversity to the pottery styles, including forms and decorations, suggesting that many of the potters were now working independently rather than as a group.
Fatimid pottery was made from a comparatively coarser clay than was available to the Basra potters, and decorative techniques on the surfaces of the vessels reflect a much higher quality than the clay or glazes. Scholars have argued that this situation suggests that perhaps the lustreware guild of potters were not making the vessels themselves but rather purchased or were supplied ready-made pots and concentrated instead on decorating them. The decoration of Fatimid lustres also shows a great deal of variation with a wide variety of styles, motifs and approaches, including royal hunting scenes, wrestlers, birds and gazelles; the art work has a sustained informal naturalism.
At about the mid-11th century, colors used in Fatimid pots became warmer, with golden, orange and red-gold lustres becoming dominant.
Sources
This project is based on the ongoing research of Trinitat Pradell and colleagues. The main sources utilized for the project are listed on the definition page for lustreware. A timeline for the Islamic civilization is also available for consultation.
An excellent source for further information about Islamic ceramics in general with much data on lustres is the Ashmolean Museum's Web-Based Teaching Course on Islamic Ceramics.
