Also incorrectly Wedgewood. [A proper name: see below.]
1. Used attrib. to designate the pottery made by Josiah Wedgwood (1730–95) and his successors at Etruria, Staffs. The best-known kinds are vases, plaques, medallions, etc., of fine clay lightly glazed, with classical designs in white relief on a blue or black ground.
Sometimes spelt with lower-case initial.
1787. Colman, Inkle & Yarico, III. i. She’s … quite dark; but very elegant; like a Wedgwood tea-pot.
1798. Phil. Trans., LXXXVIII. 568. A piece of black Wedgwood-pottery. Ibid. Wedgwood-ware.
1819. Children, Chem. Anal., 374. A still simpler … method is to place the filters in a wedgewood basin on the sand bath.
1861. J. Gardner, Househ. Med., 410. Two Wedgwood-ware mortars … and pestles to match.
1862. Catal. Internat. Exhib., Brit., II. No. 6897. Solid jasper, that is the material now exclusively called Old Wedgwood Ware.
1873. Sir J. D. Hooker, in L. Huxley, Life (1918), II. 133. I sent Gladstone a Wedgwood medallion of my Father.
b. Used to designate the blue color that is characteristic of Wedgwood ware.
1900. Bladud (Bath), 28 March, 6/3. You will recollect how many of the Christmas cards were wedgewood blue last year. Ibid., 7/1. The wedgewood frock I have described.
1909. Daily Graphic, 20 Oct., 13/2. Touches of cherry colour or Wedgwood blue insets of velvet.
c. sb. = Wedgwood pottery or ware. Also, with pl., a piece or specimen of this.
1863. Sir J. D. Hooker, in L. Huxley, Life (1918), II. 78. Wedgwoods are an unspeakable relief to me. I look over them every Sunday morning, and poke into all the little second-hand shops I pass in London, seeking medallions.
1890. Pall Mall Gaz., 12 March, 3/1. Mr. Cornelius Cox’s unique collection of wedgwood. Ibid. (1892), 25 March, 6/3. The very choice collection of old Wedgwood belonging to the late Mr. W. D. Holt, of Liverpool.
2. Designating the scale of temperature used in the pyrometer invented by Josiah Wedgwood for testing the heat of kilns. The zero corresponds to 1077° F.
1807. T. Thomson, Chem. (ed. 3), II. 510. Flint-glass melts at the temperature of 19° Wedgewood.
