Three sprigs of naively painted honeysuckle are arrayed vertically around this simple toy size mug. Typical of white salt glazed stoneware, the mineral based enamels used for the decoration appear to sit on top of the glaze. Indeed, the decoration is so light and untutored in execution as to appear almost ephemeral. Add to this potting as thin as a whisper and a handle which looks as if it too could snap at the least provocation, and one can not help but wonder at the finesse achieved in eighteenth century white salt-glazed pottery.    

Insights on this piece come from Salt Glazed Stoneware In Early America (Janine Skerry and Suzanne Hood, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2009) .  The simple shape of this piece with its thin handle identifies it with pieces as early as 1730 (fig. 9, p. 100).  However, according to Skerry and Hood, the enamel decoration dates the piece form the mid 1750's through the 1770's (p. 123).