Ceramic riveter

We recently acquire a Dutch Delftware pot in England. The lid and
the pot have old repairs with iron rivets which is not extremely
rare but inside the lid we found an old piece of paper with the
following text: "Mr Bernardi in the care of A.N. Tios, April 11th
1850". We were told that Mr Bernardi the name is of a ceramic
riveter that was offering his services from house to house and would
have repaired this object in 1850. This was a good reason for the
antique dealer who sold it to us not to have it re-restored.

Has anybody some information about Mr. Bernardi or has come across
objects with a similar reference to a riveter. It is interesting for
us to know if this story is true for many reasons. In the first
place because it tells us about the history of the object and the
practice of riveters in the 19th century and in the second place it
is an interesting ethical dilemma, what shall we do with the old
repair?

Isabelle Garachon
Conservator of ceramics, glass and stone
Rijksmuseum
Hobbemastraat 25
1071 xz Amsterdam
+31 20 6747 234


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 16:34
                 Distributed: Friday, November 22, 2002
                       Message Id: cdl-16-34-025
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