A collection of rare 18th century delftware is going under the hammer

THE antiques world is full of witticisms. My favourite: two dealers are shipwrecked on a desert island. They had just one chair between them, but they both made a good living. Or more seriously: there are no pockets in a shroud. Collectors act merely as guardians of the antiques we collect, ultimately passing them hem and the research and d knowledge we have gained about them to the next collector to do the same.

Never was this more true than in the rarefied specialist collections s formed by ceramics historians such as the he late Sir Frederick Edward ward “Ned” Warner.

A chemist and an engineer, he was fascinated by 18th century English delftware, which he started acquiring with purchases in Bethnal Green in 1952.

However, his collection began in earnest in the 1960s when, along with his second wife, Barbara, he began buying with the aim of acquiring different examples of shapes and decoration, but always with an eye to their aesthetic value.

Many pieces were sourced from sales at Christie’s and Sotheby’s, when the important named collections of other notable ceramic historians such as Louis Lucian Lipski, Sir Gilbert Mellor, and fellow chemical engineer Professor Frederic Horace Garner, were dispersed.

Now Warner’s collection is to be sold, giving other collectors the opportunity to take over guardianship of rare and important treasures. The sale at Salisbury, Wiltshire auctioneers Woolley & Wallis is on Tuesday, September 17.

The story of English delft (with a little “d”) starts in the Netherlands, taking its name from Delft in South Holland, a leading European centre for ceramics glazed with oxide of tin.

Chemist Warner would have known it by its real name of stannic oxide, but it’s best known as tinglazed earthenware. The glaze gives an opaque white enamel finish, which was decorated notably with cobalt blue, among other colours.

Flemish potters Jasper Andries and Jacob Jansen, recorded as arriving in London in 1567, were among the first to produce the ware in Britain, making tiles and apothecary bottles in Norwich.

By the late 16th century, Dutch Delftware was pouring in to Britain. With it came other Dutch potters who helped establish delftware factories in