ENCAUSTIC TILES

ornamental paving-tiles of baked pottery, much used during the Middle Ages in the pavements of churches and other ecclesiastical buildings. The encaustic tile, strictly so-called, was decorated with patterns formed by different coloured clays inlaid in the tile and fired with it. The art appears to have originated in the latter part of the twelfth century, to have attained its highest perfection during the thirteenth, and to have sunk into disuse in the fifteenth. During the whole of this period it was principally carried on in England and Normandy. After a long lapse the art was revived in England in 1830 by Wright, a Shelton potter. In modern manufacture two methods are employed, the ‘plastic? and the ‘semi-dry’ or ‘dust’ method. The first is, in all e entials, that used in the Middle Ages, except, perhaps, in the perfection of modern moulding appliances; the second consists in ramming pulverized clay with a minimum of moisture into metal dies, the subsequent firing of tiles thus consolidated being attended with le risk from shrinkage.