Clay figure

“ If we consider for a moment the properties of the material, and examine the remains which have come down to us, we shall understand at once what writing was certain to become under the triple impulse of a desire to write much, to write fast, and to use clay as we moderns use paper. Suppose oneself compelled to trace upon clay figures whose lines necessitated continual changes of direction; at each angle or curve it would be necessary to turn the hand, and with it the tool, because the clay surface, however tender it might be, would still afford a certain amount of resistance. ”

“ What a curious thing is a piece of clay, and, dear Lord, how willing it is, under our fingers! Look now, here is a bit of clay, no larger than a pullet’s egg, and no one knows what may come of it. Shall I mould you a few petals, with my thumb and forefinger, like this, and then shape up a closed golden heart, like that, and next fuss and fuse them all together, thus? You see, it is a rose! It has all the form a clay rose need ask, for the moment; if it had but color and perfume, it might be the rose of the world! ”

“ The Kafir's smile shone out again. "Once you 're sure what you mean to do, it 's easy. If I had a piece of clay, I 'd show you. There 's a way of thumbing it up, just a trick, you know—"
"I 'm there every evening," said Paul eagerly. "But tell me: do other people make things out of clay, too—over there?"
His arm pointed along the railway; the gesture comprehended sweepingly the cities and habitations of men. The idea that there was a science of fingering clay, that it was practised and studied, excited him wildly. ”

“ No industry exercises so great a fascination over those engaged in it as do the various branches of clayworking; no other substance offers so many problems of such absorbing interest to the artist, the craftsman, the geologist, the chemist and the general student of nature, whilst the differences in legal opinion as to the nature of clay could themselves occupy a volume far larger than the present one. ”

“ This wizard dust, wherein all shapes of birth,—
Soft flowers, great beasts, and huge pathetic kings,—-
Small seeds of wonder, fill a needle's girth.
This clay, this haunted house of sight and sound,
Strange sunny rooms that airily resound
With phantom music played for phantom feet—
And hark! a rat is gnawing underground.
This clay, so strong of heart, of sense so fine,
Surely such clay is more than half divine—
'Tis only fools speak evil of the clay,
The very stars are made of clay like mine.
Yet mark yon potter! see the rascal twirl
On one base wheel the dust of prince and churl ”

“ They discovered a place where clay could be found, an agreeable variety of clay, not so hard as the claystones of the Bearcamp River, and not so soft as to be sticky, but just right to cut into silk winders, hearts and rounds, and boys and girls, like those that came out of cookie pans, and dozens of other things. ”

“ It was upon clay that they learnt to write; it was to slabs of terra-cotta that their kings confided the memory of their victories and acts of devotion, and the private population their engagements and the contracts into which they entered. For thousands of years tablets of clay thus received not only long texts, but those impressions from seals, each one of which represents a signature. While wet and soft, clay readily accepted any symbol that man chose to place upon it; once it was burnt, those symbols became practically indestructible. ”

“ The chief uses of clay have been recognized since the earliest periods of civilization; the ancient Assyrian and Egyptian records contain numerous references to the employment of clay for the manufacture of bricks and for fulling or whitening cloth.
Clays are distributed so widely and in many cases are so readily accessible that their existence and some of their characteristics are known in entirely uncivilized regions. The use of certain white clays as a food, or at any rate as a means of staving off hunger, is common among some tribes of very primitive peoples. ”

“ It is this amenable ductile quality, so easily171 receptive of the most emotional touch, that has made and still makes clay such an admirable medium of expression for the young,—whether young in the history of the world or young in actual years. And this malleability is accompanied by a tenacity that permits slow building up, remodelling, and high finish, suitable to work of the most painstaking character. ”

“ If you wish to make a figure in marble, first make one of clay, and when you have finished it, let it dry and place it in a case which should be large enough, after the figure is taken out of it, to receive also the marble, from which you intend to reveal the figure in imitation of the one in clay. ”

“ Nothing but educating the hand and eye to the point of being able to take a dead head, and, by knowledge of its living anatomy, to model it in clay so truthfully as to far surpass any other process whatever. I can, unfortunately, give no directions for doing this. I can merely say, in the words of many unpractical "guide books" to art: "Take a board, some tools, a well-kneaded lump of clay; place the head before you in strong light, and turn out a lifelike representation of it; wrinkles, muscles, and all — in clay." ”

“ Well, let the preacher have it so, And clay we are, and clay shall be;— Why iterate?—for this I know, That clay does very well for me. When clay has such red mouths to kiss, Firm hands to grasp, it is enough: How can I take it aught amiss We are not made of rarer stuff? And if one tempt you to believe His choice would be immortal gold, Question him, Can you then conceive A warmer heart than clay can hold? Or richer joys than clay can feel? And when perforce he falters nay, Bid him renounce his wish and kneel In thanks for this same kindly clay. ”

“ Seated on his bench, the workman places in the centre of the disc a certain quantity of soft moist clay, and turning the wheel with his foot, moulds the said paste with both hands, until it assumes the desired shape. You can imagine no prettier spectacle than that of a skilful potter causing the clay, under his nimble fingers, to assume the most varied forms. It seems as if by miracle the vase was created suddenly, and the rude clay sprang into a life and beauty of its own. ”

“ Owing to the widely differing substances from which clays can, apparently, be formed and the peculiar difficulties which are experienced in investigating the nature of clay substance from different sources, it is by no means easy to devise a scheme of classification of clays, though many of these have been attempted by different scientists. ”

“ Guy fancied that there was not so much "expression" in the faces and dramatic action with the people we met here as in other places, and hazarded a guess that this was a result of looking at so much inexpressionless clay. There is not much in clay to lay hold of the imagination, except its whiteness, and the purer the blanker it is; but, then, smirches in clay would cause a sensation, like the entrance of a lady with a past into a party of sweet young things playing at goodness in a social comedy. There is little in the article suggestive of anything but money. ”

“ Natural clays, even when most pure, show a considerable range of composition, and hence cannot be regarded as consisting of a single mineral; clay is a rock, and has that variability which characterizes all rocks. Of the essential properties of clay some are merely physical, and depend on the minute size of the particles. If any rock be taken (even a piece of pure quartz) and crushed to a very fine powder, it will show some of the peculiarities of clays ”

“ The variety of silicates and other minerals which—in a partially decomposed condition—go to form 'clays' is so great that the complete separation of the smallest particles of them from those of the true clay present has never been accomplished and our knowledge of the mineralogical constitution of many of the best known clays is far from complete.
It is highly probable that the action of water does not cease with the formation of clay, but that it slowly [82] effects an increase in the plasticity of the clay. ”

“ The more important uses of clays for building and other purposes are naturally confined to the more civilized nations.
The term clay (A.S. cloeg; Welsh clai; Dutch kley) although used in a scientific sense to include a variety of argillaceous earths (Fr. argile = clay) used in the manufacture of bricks, tiles, pottery [2] and ceramic products (Gr. keramos = potter's earth) generally, is really a word of popular origin and use. ”

“ Yet the curious fact that the purest clays—the kaolins—are remarkably deficient in plasticity shows that molecular constitution is not, alone, sufficient. Others hold that the remarkably small size of clay particles enables them to pack together more closely than do particles of other [22] materials and to retain around them a film of water which acts partly as a lubricant, facilitating the change of shape of the mass when under pressure, and partly as an adhesive, causing the particles to adhere to each other when the pressure is removed. ”

“ From a consideration of a classification such as the foregoing, together with a detailed study of the physical and chemical properties of the material as a whole, and also of the various portions into which it may be divided—particularly that which has been isolated by mechanical methods of purification and separation—it is not difficult to gain a fairly accurate idea of the nature of any clay. ”

“ KERAMOS Turn, turn, my wheel? Turn round and round Without a pause, without a sound: So spins the flying world away! This clay, well mixed with marl and sand, Follows the motion of my hand; Far some must follow, and some command, Though all are made of clay! ”

“ Of course, it is necessary to leave some clay here and there to attach the various forms to the slab. The under-cutting may be carried to such a pitch as to make the design look weak, and as though it would fall to pieces with a puff of wind. When this is the case, I reckon the finishing has been carried too far. Clay should always look strong enough to hold together, and I may say I never thought much of that fancy china one sees which is covered with flowers and foliage modelled as delicately as though wrought in some precious metal. ”

“ A plastic substance is one with the characteristics of 'a fluid of so great a viscosity that it does not lose its shape under the influence of gravitation.'
The causes of plasticity appear to be somewhat numerous, though there is no generally accepted explanation of this remarkable quality which distinguishes clays from most other substances. It is true that wet sand, soap, wax, lead and some other materials possess a certain amount of plasticity, but not to anything like the same extent as clay. ”

“ By command of the magicians, a number of men brought lumps of wet clay, which they built around her body in a pillar-like form, kneading them closely as they proceeded, and gradually covering her with clay. ”

“ There is, at present, no definition of 'marl' which is quite satisfactory; a maker of London stock bricks understanding by this term a clay containing at least 10 per cent. of chalk; a maker of white Suffolk bricks a material containing at least twice this amount; an agriculturalist any soil, not obviously sandy, which will make his clay land less sticky; and many geologists any friable argillaceous earths. ”

“ A small mass of moistened clay, mixed with sifted ashes of halfeh-grass and kneaded like bread, is placed upon a round plate of wood which whirls by a treadle. As it revolves the workman with his hands fashions the clay into vessels of all shapes, graceful and delicate, with a sleight of hand that is wonderful. ”

“ E. H. L. Schwarz (35) has suggested that many clays are composed of small globular masses of plates so arranged as to form an open network (fig. 4) which is sufficiently strong not to be destroyed by pressure. In the presence of water and much rubbing the plates are separated and are made to lie flat on each other, thereby giving a plastic and impermeable mass. If this is really the case it would explain the porosity and large surface of some clays and might account for their adsorptive power.
Fig. 4. Illustrating the structure of a 'clay crumb.' (After Schwarz.) ”

“ The qualities necessary in clay for modelling are plasticity, which enables it to be worked without falling to pieces, and fineness—a perfect freedom from grit, small stones, and other impurities. It should be quite soft to the touch, and when pressed and kneaded should feel smooth and silky. ”

“ The natural colour of a clay is no criterion as to its purity, for some of the darkest ball clays produce perfectly white ware on burning, whilst some of the paler clays are useless to the potter on account of the intensity of their colour when they come out of the kiln. The colour of raw clays is largely due to the carbonaceous matter they contain, and as this burns away in the kiln, the final colour of the ware bears no relation whatever to that of the original clay. ”

“ It is he who, on a little revolving table between his knees pressed with his hands, magically transforms the lump of clay into beautiful shapes. Unfortunately, modern methods are eliminating the work of "the thrower," whose art dates back to the remotest past in the East when man first made clay into objects of beauty. ”

“ Clay can be purchased at the art stores by the pound, or in the country a very good quality of light, slate-colored clay may sometimes be found along the edges of brooks or in swampy places where running water has washed away the dirt and gravel, leaving a clear deposit of clay of the consistency of putty. ”