made by Josiah Wedgwood & Sons Ltd, Burslem, England

jasperware (unglazed stoneware)

collection of the Mackelvie Trust Board, Auckland, 1885 (568); 1932.233, 17902, K1843

The facsimile of the Portland vase (based on the Barberini Vase a first century BC Roman cameo glass vase) is considered the pinnacle of English pottery owner, Josiah Wedgwood’s pioneering achievements.

The Portland vase, acquired by the Dowager Duchess of Portland in 1784, was the crowning glory of her collection. When the auction of the contents of her Portland Museum was announced Josiah Wedgwood sought to acquire the vase so he could imitate it in his new and revolutionary Jasper ware body - a type of stoneware hard enough to be carved or worked on a lathe.

Secretly repurchased by the family, the vase was loaned by the third Duke of Portland to Wedgwood, who experimented and produced trials for over four years to perfect the Jasper body even further, to minutely and faithfully replicate its original form.

The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, England has noted that “The first person outside the Wedgwood Factory to see the finished article was the potter's friend, the physician and botanist Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802), grandfather of Charles Darwin.” Their version of the vase is probably the facsimile that Wedgwood sent to Darwin in September 1789, with strict instructions not to show it to anyone outside his family. Shortly after its arrival, however, Darwin wrote to Wedgwood: "I have disobeyed you and shown your vase to two or three; but they were philosophers, not cogniscenti. How can I possess a jewel, and not communicate the pleasure to a few Derby philosophers?"

Wedgwood increased the notoriety of the Portland vase through his facsimiles. They served as an inspiration to numerous glass and porcelain makers from about the beginning of the 18th century onwards and was extensively copied particularly during the Victorian period. The Auckland Museum facsimile was purchased before 1885 by James Tannock Mackelvie (1824 - 1885) and is on display in the Mackelvie Collection Gallery on the first floor.