André Masséna
André Masséna, 1st Duc de Rivoli, 1st Prince d'Essling was a French military commander during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He was one of the original eighteen Marshals of the Empire created by Napoleon, with the nickname l'Enfant chéri de la Victoire. Many of Napoleon's generals were trained at the finest French and European military academies, but Masséna was among those who achieved greatness without the benefit of formal education. While those of noble rank acquired their education and promotions as a matter of privilege, Masséna rose from humble origins to such prominence that Napoleon referred to him as "the greatest name of my military Empire." His military career is equaled by few commanders in European history. In addition to his battlefield successes, Masséna's leadership aided the careers of many. A majority of the French marshals of the time served under his command at some point. André Masséna was born in Nice, part of the Kingdom of Sardinia at the time, on 16 May 1758.
He was the son of shopkeeper Jules Marguerite Fabre. His father died in 1764, after his mother remarried, he was sent to live with father's relatives. At the age of thirteen, Masséna became a cabin boy aboard a merchant ship. In 1775, after four years at sea, he returned to Nice and enlisted in the French Army as a private in the Royal Italian regiment. By the time he left in 1789, he had risen to the rank of warrant officer, the top rank achievable by non-noblemen. On August 10 of that year, he married Anne Marie Rosalie Lamare, daughter of a surgeon in Antibes, lived with her in her home town. After a brief stint as a smuggler in Northern Italy, he rejoined the army in 1791 and was made an officer, rising to the rank of colonel by 1792; when the French Revolutionary Wars broke out in April 1792, Masséna and his battalion were deployed along the border to Piedmont. Masséna prepared his battalion for battle in the hope that it would be incorporated into the regular army; that October, a month after the occupation of Nice, the battalion was one of four volunteer battalions that became part of the French Armée d'Italie.
Masséna distinguished himself in battle and was promoted, attaining the rank of général de brigade in August 1793 and général de division that December. He was prominent in every campaign on the Italian Riviera over the next two years, including the attack on Saorgio in 1794 and the battle of Loano in 1795; when Napoleon Bonaparte took command in March 1796, Masséna was commanding the two divisions of the army's advance guard. During the campaign in Italy in 1796-1797, Masséna became one of Bonaparte's most important subordinates, he played a significant role in engagements at Montenotte and Dego in the spring, took a leading role at the battles of Lonato, Bassano and Arcola in the summer and fall, as well as the Battle of Rivoli and the fall of Mantua that winter. When an Austrian relief army was sent to aid Mantua in January 1797, the French forces were overrun near Rivoli, while other enemy columns advanced on Verona and Mantua. At 5:00 P. M. on 13 January, Masséna was ordered to march from Verona to Rivoli, fifteen miles away.
Following a forced night march across the snow-covered roads, the first of his troops reached the battlefield at 6:00 A. M. Bonaparte deployed them on the left flank, they were shifted to strengthen the sagging center and deployed to crush an Austrian flanking maneuver. Masséna's troops played a decisive role in the victory; the next day, with little rest, Masséna and his troops marched 39 miles in 24 hours to intercept a second Austrian army advancing to relieve Mantua. At La Favorita, he closed the pincer on the Austrian army. In the space of five days, Masséna's division played a major role in an operation that left over 35,000 Austrian soldiers either dead or imprisoned. Two weeks the 30,000-man garrison at Mantua surrendered. With his final victory complete, Napoleon praised Masséna with the name "l'enfant chéri de la victoire." The president of the Directory in Paris, Jean Rewbell, was congratulatory: "The Executive Directory congratulates you, citizen general, for the new success that you have obtained against the enemies of the Republic.
The brave division that you command has covered itself with glory in the three consecutive days that forced Mantua to capitulate, the Directory is obliged to regard you among the most capable and useful generals of the Republic."In 1799, Masséna was granted an important command in Switzerland replacing Charles Edward Jennings de Kilmaine. As Russian reinforcements marched to support the Austrian armies in Italy and Switzerland, the Directory consolidated the remnants of the French armies under Masséna's command. With a force totaling 90,000 men, Masséna was ordered to defend the entire frontier, he repulsed Archduke Charles's advance on Zurich in June, but retired from the city and took up positions in the surrounding mountains. He triumphed over the Russians and Alexander Korsakov at the Second Battle of Zurich in September aware of the advance of Russian general Alexander Suvorov toward St. Gotthard shifted his troops southward. General Claude Jacques Lecourbe's division delayed the Russians' entrance into Switzerland at St Gotthard Pass, when Suvorov forced his way through, he was met by units of Jean-de-Dieu Soult's French division blocking the route at Altdorf.
Unable to break through the French lines and aware of Korsakov's disastrous defeat, the Russian general turned east through the high and difficult Pragel Pass to Glarus where he was dismayed to
Théâtre de la Renaissance
The name Théâtre de la Renaissance has been used successively for three distinct Parisian theatre companies. The first two companies, which were short-lived enterprises in the 19th century, used the Salle Ventadour, now an office building on the Rue Méhul in the 2nd arrondissement; the current company was founded in 1873, its much smaller theatre was built that same year next to the Porte Saint-Martin at 20 boulevard Saint-Martin, in the 10th arrondissement. Besides performances of musical theatre, Feydeau's farces were first produced in this theatre, plays by Victorien Sardou. Among the actors who triumphed there were Sarah Bernhardt, Eleonora Duse, Raimu Agnès Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri; the first company to be called Théâtre de la Renaissance opened its doors in 1838 under the sponsorship of Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas, père, who wanted to have a location for mounting their historical dramas. The Salle Ventadour was used. On 8 November 1838, Hugo's Ruy Blas starring Frédérick Lemaître had a triumphant premiere, the French version of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor retitled and reworked as Lucie de Lammermoor was produced there in August 1839.
His L'ange de Nisida, reworked into La favorite, was commissioned by the company, although never performed due to bankruptcy. In April 1839, L'Alchimiste and Paul Jones by Alexandre Dumas were staged, due to theatrical intrigues, it was forced to close in 1841. In 1868 Carvalho obtained the rights to stage operatic works at the Ventadour more elaborate works in the Théâtre Lyrique's repertory, with Adolphe Deloffre as chief conductor; the season included other works by Gounod and Clapisson. The company was short-lived, lasting from 16 March 1868 to 5 May 1868; the architect Charles de Lalande designed a new'théâtre à l'italienne' on the site of the Deffieux restaurant. The inauguration took place on 8 March 1873 with La Femme de feu by Adolphe Belot. Hippolyte Hopstein directed the theatre until December 1875. Thérèse Raquin was premiered in July 1873, Giroflé-Girofla and La petite mariée, opéras-bouffes by Charles Lecocq in 1874 and 1875. Victor Koning succeeded Hopstein from December 1875 until 1882, opéras-bouffes and opéras-comiques featured strongly: in 1877 La Marjolaine by Charles Lecocq, Le Tzigane by Johann Strauss, in 1878 Le petit duc by Lecocq, in 1879 La Petite Mademoiselle by Lecocq and in 1880 Belle Lurette by Jacques Offenbach.
From 1882 to 1893 the theatre lacked direction although the period saw the creation of Fanfreluche, an opéra-comique by Gaston Serpette in 1883, La Parisienne and La Navette by Henry Becque in 1885, Tailleur pour dames by Feydeau in 1886, Isoline by André Messager in 1888, Madame Chrysanthème by Messager in 1893. Sarah Bernhardt took over the direction from 1893 to 1899, during which time Gismonda by Victorien Sardou in 1894, La Princesse Lointaine by Edmond Rostand in 1895, Les Amants by Maurice Donnay and La Figurante by François Curel in 1896, La Ville morte by Gabriele d'Annunzio, L'Affranchie by Maurice Donnay, Le Radeau de la Méduse by Romain Coolus in 1898, were all premiered. On 3 December 1896, Bernhardt created herself Lorenzaccio by Musset and the following year La Samaritaine by Edmond Rostand; the Milliaud brothers ran the theatre from 1899, followed by Firmin Gémier in 1901, until the arrival of Lucien Guitry from October 1902 until 1909. The actor Albert Tarride directed the théâtre Cora Laparcerie took over in 1913, with Marcel Paston from 1928 to 1933.
In 1942, while the theatre was threatened with destruction, Henri Varna acquired the building and Jean Darcante put on shows. In Octobre 1956 the actress Véra Korène of the Comédie-Française became director of a theatre restored in the style of the Second Empire. 23 September 1959 saw the creation of Les Séquestrés d'Altona by Jean-Paul Sartre with Serge Reggiani. 1960 saw L'Etouffe-Chrétien by Félicien Marceau with Arletty, with Louisiane by Marcel Aymé in 1961, Qui a peur de Virginia Woolf? in 1962 and Douce-Amère, first play by Jean Poiret in 1970. In 1978 there was a season of opérettes, from 1981 to 1988 Michèle Lavalard led the théâtre succeeded by Niels Arestrup. In 1990 La Cuisse du Steward by Jean-Michel Ribes was premiered, in 1994 Un Air de Famille by Agnès Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri. Under Christian Spillemaecker and Bruno Moynot, the theatre staged comic plays and shows with success; the current capacity is 650 seats. Site du Théâtre de la Renaissance Quelques cartes postales du théâtre
Antoine-Nicolas Bailly
Antoine-Nicolas Louis Bailly was a French architect. Born in Paris as the son of a postal official and the eldest of eleven children, Bailly entered the atelier of architect François Debret and through him the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in 1830 studying under Félix Duban. From 1834, upon his father's retirement, Bailly found himself responsible as the breadwinner for the entire family. In 1850, with the support of Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, Bailly became the architect of the dioceses of Bourges and Digne. From 1875 to 1886, he served as diocesan architect of Limoges, he was the supervising architect of the Notre Dame de Paris from 1883 to 1886, after Viollet-le-Duc's restorations. In 1854 Bailly was appointed inspector of works in Paris; as such he participated in the completion of the Old Town Hall and the construction of the Fontaine Molière under Louis Visconti. In 1860, Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann commissioned Bailly with the administrative building for the 4th arrondissement of Paris, which served as a model for others.
His best-known work overall, although not the most admired, is the Tribunal de commerce de Paris on the Île de la Cité, completed in 1865, which Napoleon III had requested be designed in the style of the town hall of Brescia. Its business courts are organized around a glass atrium reaching the entire height of the building; the exterior features architectural sculpture by Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse. Bailly was made a Knight of the Legion of Honour in 1853, Officer in 1868, promoted to Commander in 1881, he was elected to the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1875, taking the chair of Henri Labrouste, served as its president. Architect Ernest Sanson began his career as a draftsman in Bailly's firm, took over the office in 1865. Expansion of the Cathedral of Saint-Jerome Cathedral of Digne, completed 1862 construction of the bell tower of the Valencia Cathedral completion of the cathedral of Limoges Tribunal de commerce de Paris 1860-1865 facade of the Lycée Saint-Louis, Paris mairie of the 4th arrondissement of Paris, 1866–1868 Crédit Foncier de France, Paris structurae page online biography in French
Sculpture
Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sculptural processes used carving and modelling, in stone, ceramics and other materials but, since Modernism, there has been an complete freedom of materials and process. A wide variety of materials may be worked by removal such as carving, assembled by welding or modelling, or molded or cast. Sculpture in stone survives far better than works of art in perishable materials, represents the majority of the surviving works from ancient cultures, though conversely traditions of sculpture in wood may have vanished entirely. However, most ancient sculpture was brightly painted, this has been lost. Sculpture has been central in religious devotion in many cultures, until recent centuries large sculptures, too expensive for private individuals to create, were an expression of religion or politics; those cultures whose sculptures have survived in quantities include the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean and China, as well as many in Central and South America and Africa.
The Western tradition of sculpture began in ancient Greece, Greece is seen as producing great masterpieces in the classical period. During the Middle Ages, Gothic sculpture represented the agonies and passions of the Christian faith; the revival of classical models in the Renaissance produced famous sculptures such as Michelangelo's David. Modernist sculpture moved away from traditional processes and the emphasis on the depiction of the human body, with the making of constructed sculpture, the presentation of found objects as finished art works. A basic distinction is between sculpture in the round, free-standing sculpture, such as statues, not attached to any other surface, the various types of relief, which are at least attached to a background surface. Relief is classified by the degree of projection from the wall into low or bas-relief, high relief, sometimes an intermediate mid-relief. Sunk-relief is a technique restricted to ancient Egypt. Relief is the usual sculptural medium for large figure groups and narrative subjects, which are difficult to accomplish in the round, is the typical technique used both for architectural sculpture, attached to buildings, for small-scale sculpture decorating other objects, as in much pottery and jewellery.
Relief sculpture may decorate steles, upright slabs of stone also containing inscriptions. Another basic distinction is between subtractive carving techniques, which remove material from an existing block or lump, for example of stone or wood, modelling techniques which shape or build up the work from the material. Techniques such as casting and moulding use an intermediate matrix containing the design to produce the work; the term "sculpture" is used to describe large works, which are sometimes called monumental sculpture, meaning either or both of sculpture, large, or, attached to a building. But the term properly covers many types of small works in three dimensions using the same techniques, including coins and medals, hardstone carvings, a term for small carvings in stone that can take detailed work; the large or "colossal" statue has had an enduring appeal since antiquity. Another grand form of portrait sculpture is the equestrian statue of a rider on horse, which has become rare in recent decades.
The smallest forms of life-size portrait sculpture are the "head", showing just that, or the bust, a representation of a person from the chest up. Small forms of sculpture include the figurine a statue, no more than 18 inches tall, for reliefs the plaquette, medal or coin. Modern and contemporary art have added a number of non-traditional forms of sculpture, including sound sculpture, light sculpture, environmental art, environmental sculpture, street art sculpture, kinetic sculpture, land art, site-specific art. Sculpture is an important form of public art. A collection of sculpture in a garden setting can be called a sculpture garden. One of the most common purposes of sculpture is in some form of association with religion. Cult images are common in many cultures, though they are not the colossal statues of deities which characterized ancient Greek art, like the Statue of Zeus at Olympia; the actual cult images in the innermost sanctuaries of Egyptian temples, of which none have survived, were evidently rather small in the largest temples.
The same is true in Hinduism, where the simple and ancient form of the lingam is the most common. Buddhism brought the sculpture of religious figures to East Asia, where there seems to have been no earlier equivalent tradition, though again simple shapes like the bi and cong had religious significance. Small sculptures as personal possessions go back to the earliest prehistoric art, the use of large sculpture as public art to impress the viewer with the power of a ruler, goes back at least to the Great Sphinx of some 4,500 years ago. In archaeology and art history the appearance, sometimes disappearance, of large or monumental sculpture in a culture is regarded as of great significance, though tracing the emergence is complicated by the presumed existence of sculpture in wood and other perishable materials of which no record remains; the ability to s
Baroque
The Baroque is a ornate and extravagant style of architecture, painting and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th until the mid-18th century. It preceded the Rococo and Neoclassical styles, it was encouraged by the Catholic Church as a means to counter the simplicity and austerity of Protestant architecture and music, though Lutheran Baroque art developed in parts of Europe as well. The Baroque style used contrast, exuberant detail, deep colour and surprise to achieve a sense of awe; the style began at the start of the 17th century in Rome spread to France, northern Italy and Portugal to Austria and southern Germany. By the 1730s, it had evolved into an more flamboyant style, called rocaille or Rococo, which appeared in France and central Europe until the mid to late 18th century; the English word baroque comes directly from the French, may have been adapted from the Portuguese term barroco, a flawed pearl. Both words are related to the Spanish term berruca; the term did not describe a style of music or art.
Prior to the 18th century, the French baroque and Portuguese barroco were terms related to jewelry, An example from 1531 uses the term to describe pearls in an inventory of Charles V's treasures. The word appears in a 1694 edition of Le Dictionnaire de l'Académie Française, which describes baroque as "only used for pearls that are imperfectly round." A 1728 Portuguese dictionary describes barroco as relating to a "coarse and uneven pearl."The French term for the artistic style may have had roots in the medieval Latin word baroco, a philosophical term, invented in the 13th century by scholastics to describe a complicated type of syllogism, or logical argument. In the 16th century the philosopher Michel de Montaigne associated the term'baroco' with "Bizarre and uselessly complicated." In the 18th century, the term was used to describe music, was not flattering. In an anonymous satirical review of the première of Jean-Philippe Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie in October 1733, printed in the Mercure de France in May 1734, the critic wrote that the novelty in this opera was "du barocque", complaining that the music lacked coherent melody, was unsparing with dissonances changed key and meter, speedily ran through every compositional device.
In 1762, Le Dictionnaire de l'Académie Française wrote that the term could be used figuratively to describe something "irregular, bizarre or unequal."Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a musician and composer as well as philosopher, wrote in 1768 in the Encyclopédie: "Baroque music is that in which the harmony is confused, loaded with modulations and dissonances. The singing is harsh and unnatural, the intonation difficult, the movement limited, it appears that term comes from the word'baroco' used by logicians."In 1788, the term was defined by Quatremère de Quincy in the Encyclopédie Méthodique as "an architectural style, adorned and tormented". The terms "style baroque" and "musique baroque" appeared in Le Dictionnaire de l'Académie Française in 1835. By the mid-19th century, art critics and historians had adopted the term as a way to ridicule post-Renaissance art; this was the sense of the word as used in 1855 by the leading art historian Jacob Burkhardt, who wrote that baroque artists "despised and abused detail" because they lacked "respect for tradition."Alternatively, a derivation from the name of the Italian painter Federico Barocci has been suggested.
In 1888, the art historian Heinrich Wölfflin published the first serious academic work on the style, Renaissance und Barock, which described the differences between the painting and architecture of the Renaissance and the Baroque. The Baroque style of architecture was a result of doctrines adopted by the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent in 1545–63, in response to the Protestant Reformation; the first phase of the Counter-Reformation had imposed a severe, academic style on religious architecture, which had appealed to intellectuals but not the mass of churchgoers. The Council of Trent decided instead to appeal to a more popular audience, declared that the arts should communicate religious themes with direct and emotional involvement. Lutheran Baroque art developed as a confessional marker of identity, in response to the Great Iconoclasm of Calvinists. Baroque churches were designed with a large central space, where the worshippers could be close to the altar, with a dome or cupola high overhead, allowing light to illuminate the church below.
The dome was one of the central symbolic features of baroque architecture illustrating the union between the heavens and the earth, The inside of the cupola was lavishly decorated with paintings of angels and saints, with stucco statuettes of angels, giving the impression to those below of looking up at heaven. Another feature of baroque churches are the quadratura. Quadratura paintings of Atlantes below the cornices appear to be supporting the ceiling of the church. Unlike the painted ceilings of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel, which combined different scenes, each with its own perspective, to be looked at one at a time, the Baroque ceiling paintings were created so the viewer on the floor of the church would see the entire ceiling in correct perspective, as if the figures were real; the interiors of baroque churches became more and more ornate in the High Baroque, an
Bucharest
Bucharest is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, at 44°25′57″N 26°06′14″E, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than 60 km north of the Danube River and the Bulgarian border. Bucharest was first mentioned in documents in 1459, it became the capital of Romania in 1862 and is the centre of Romanian media and art. Its architecture is a mix of historical, communist era and modern. In the period between the two World Wars, the city's elegant architecture and the sophistication of its elite earned Bucharest the nickname of "Little Paris". Although buildings and districts in the historic city centre were damaged or destroyed by war and above all Nicolae Ceaușescu's program of systematization, many survived and have been renovated. In recent years, the city has been experiencing an cultural boom. In 2016, the historical city centre was listed as "endangered" by the World Monuments Watch. According to the 2011 census, 1,883,425 inhabitants live within the city limits, a decrease from the 2002 census.
Adding the satellite towns around the urban area, the proposed metropolitan area of Bucharest would have a population of 2.27 million people. According to Eurostat, Bucharest has a functional urban area of 2,412,530 residents. Bucharest is the sixth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits, after London, Madrid and Paris. Economically, Bucharest is the most prosperous city in Romania and is one of the main industrial centres and transportation hubs of Eastern and Central Europe; the city has big convention facilities, educational institutes, cultural venues, traditional "shopping arcades", recreational areas. The city proper is administratively known as the "Municipality of Bucharest", has the same administrative level as that of a national county, being further subdivided into six sectors, each governed by a local mayor; the Romanian name București has an unverified origin. Tradition connects the founding of Bucharest with the name of Bucur, a prince, an outlaw, a fisherman, a shepherd or a hunter, according to different legends.
In Romanian, the word stem bucurie means "joy", it is believed to be of Dacian origin, hence the city Bucharest means "city of joy". Other etymologies are given by early scholars, including the one of an Ottoman traveller, Evliya Çelebi, who said that Bucharest was named after a certain "Abu-Kariș", from the tribe of "Bani-Kureiș". In 1781, Austrian historian Franz Sulzer claimed that it was related to bucurie, bucuros, or a se bucura, while an early 19th-century book published in Vienna assumed its name has been derived from "Bukovie", a beech forest. In English, the city's name was rendered as Bukarest. A native or resident of Bucharest is called a "Bucharester". Bucharest's history alternated periods of development and decline from the early settlements in antiquity until its consolidation as the national capital of Romania late in the 19th century. First mentioned as the "Citadel of București" in 1459, it became the residence of the famous Wallachian prince Vlad III the Impaler; the Ottomans appointed Greek administrators to run the town from the 18th century.
A short-lived revolt initiated by Tudor Vladimirescu in 1821 led to the end of the rule of Constantinople Greeks in Bucharest. The Old Princely Court was erected by Mircea Ciobanul in the mid-16th century. Under subsequent rulers, Bucharest was established as the summer residence of the royal court. During the years to come, it competed with Târgoviște on the status of capital city after an increase in the importance of southern Muntenia brought about by the demands of the suzerain power – the Ottoman Empire. Bucharest became the permanent location of the Wallachian court after 1698. Destroyed by natural disasters and rebuilt several times during the following 200 years, hit by Caragea's plague in 1813–14, the city was wrested from Ottoman control and occupied at several intervals by the Habsburg Monarchy and Imperial Russia, it was placed under Russian administration between 1828 and the Crimean War, with an interlude during the Bucharest-centred 1848 Wallachian revolution. An Austrian garrison took possession after the Russian departure.
On 23 March 1847, a fire consumed about 2,000 buildings. In 1862, after Wallachia and Moldavia were united to form the Principality of Romania, Bucharest became the new nation's capital city. In 1881, it became the political centre of the newly proclaimed Kingdom of Romania under King Carol I. During the second half of the 19th century, the city's population increased and a new period of urban development began. During this period, gas lighting, horse-drawn trams, limited electrification were introduced; the Dâmbovița River was massively channelled in 1883, thus putting a stop to endemic floods like the 1865 flooding of Bucharest. The Fortifications of Bucharest were built; the extravagant architecture and cosmopolitan high culture of this period won Bucharest the nickname of "Little Paris" of the east, with Calea Victoriei as its Champs-Élysées. Between 6 December 1916 and November 1918, the city was occupied by German forces as a result of the Battle of Bucharest, with the official capital temporarily moved to Iași, in
Mintons
Mintons was a major company in Staffordshire pottery, "Europe's leading ceramic factory during the Victorian era", an independent business from 1793 to 1968. It was a leader in ceramic design, working in a number of different ceramic bodies, decorative techniques, "a glorious pot-pourri of styles - Rococo shapes with Oriental motifs, Classical shapes with Medieval designs and Art Nouveau borders were among the many wonderful concoctions"; as well as pottery vessels and sculptures, the firm was a leading manufacturer of tiles and other architectural ceramics, producing work for both the Houses of Parliament and United States Capitol. The family continued to control the business until the mid-20th century. Mintons had the usual Staffordshire variety of company and trading names over the years, the products of all periods are referred to as either "Minton", as in "Minton china", or "Mintons", the mark used on many. Mintons Ltd was the company name from 1879 onwards; the firm began in 1793 when Thomas Minton founded his pottery factory in Stoke-upon-Trent, England as "Thomas Minton and Sons", producing earthenware.
He formed a partnership, Minton & Poulson, c.1796, with Joseph Poulson who made bone china from c.1798 in his new near-by china pottery. When Poulson died in 1808, Minton carried on alone, using Poulson's pottery for china until 1816, he built a new china pottery in 1824. No early earthenware is marked, a good deal of it was made for other potters. On the other hand, some early factory records survive in the Minton Archive, much more complete than those of most Staffordshire firms, the early porcelain is marked with pattern numbers, which can be tied to the surviving pattern-books. Early Mintons products were standard domestic tableware in blue transfer-printed or painted earthenware, including the ever-popular Willow pattern. Minton had trained as an engraver for transfer printing with Thomas Turner. From c 1798 production included bone china from his partner Joseph Poulson's near-by china pottery. China production ceased c. 1816 following Joseph Poulson's death in 1808, recommencing in a new pottery in 1824.
Minton was a prime mover, the main shareholder in the Hendra Company, formed in 1800 to exploit china clay and other minerals from Cornwall. Named after Hendra Common, St Dennis, the partners included Minton, Wedgwood, William Adams, the owners of New Hall porcelain; the company was profitable for many years, reducing the cost of materials to the owning potters, selling to other firms. Early Mintons porcelain was "decorated in the restrained Regency style", much of it just with edging patterns rather than painted scenes, thus keeping prices within the reach of a large section of the middle class. Early porcelain Minton's two sons and Herbert, were taken into partnership in 1817, but Thomas went in to the church and was ordained in 1825. Herbert had been working in the business since 1808, when he was 16 as a travelling salesman. On his death in 1836, Minton was succeeded by his son Herbert Minton, who took John Boyle as a partner to help him the same year, given the size of the business. Herbert developed new production techniques and took the business into new fields, notably including decorative encaustic tile making, through his association with leading architects and designers including Augustus Pugin and, it is said, Prince Albert.
Minton entered into partnership with Michael Hollins in 1845 and formed the tile making firm of Minton, Hollins & Company, at the forefront of a large newly developing market as suppliers of durable decorative finishes for walls and floors in churches, public buildings, grand palaces and simple domestic houses. The firm exhibited at trade exhibitions throughout the world and examples of its exhibition displays are held at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D. C. where the company gained many prestigious contracts including tiled flooring for the United States Capitol. The "encaustic" technique allowed clays of different colours to be used in the same tile, allowing far greater decorative possibilities. Great numbers of new churches and public buildings were given floors in the tiles, despite the protests of William Morris, many medieval church floors were "updated" with them. Hard white unglazed "statuary porcelain" called Parian ware due to its resemblance to Parian marble, was first introduced by Spode in the 1840s.
It was further developed by Minton who employed John Bell, Hiram Powers and other famous sculptors to produce figures for reproduction. Mintons had been making some figures in the more demanding medium of biscuit porcelain, reused some of these moulds in Parian. In the year ended 1842, the sales of the main company Minton & Co totalled £45K, divided as follows: Porcelain: gilt £13K and ungilt £8K Earthenware: enamelled £6K, printed £10K, "cream-colour" £4K, coloured bodies £2K Ironstone: 2KMuch of the transfer printing was done by outside specialists, "engraving done off the Works" cost £641, while "engraving done on the Works" cost £183. 1820 to 1850 In 1849 Minton engaged a young French ceramicist Léon Arnoux as art director who remained with the Minton Company until 1892. This and other enterprising appointments enabled the company to widen its product ranges, it was Arnoux who formulated the tin-glaze used for Minton’s rare tin-glazed Majolica together with the in-glaze metallic oxide enamels with which it was painted.
He developed the colored lead glazes and kiln technology for Minton’s successful lead-glazed Palissy ware also called ‘majolica’. This product transformed Minton’s profitability for the next thirty years
