Pieces of Viking pottery with traces of cat and dog paws, seen at the MusĂŠe de Normandie in Caen Castle
âSo back in the day pets already ruined their ownerâs artwork.â - My sis who took the photo
âruinedâ? made better
Itâs very humanizing to imagine some poor potter in the past screaming ânnnnooooooo bad kittyâ somewhere in Scandinavia
If it was ruined, the artisan wouldnât have baked it.
Thatâs⌠thatâs a delightful point you just made.
This person chose to bake and keep their catâs artistic contribution.
i was in spain once and there was a building with a tile that had been laid down in roman times: it had a dogâs paw print. and the thing was that after the dog did that print, the wet tile was dried, and then fired, and then shipped, and then laid, and for two thousand years every person who encountered that tile thought âaw! paw print!â and kept it. this vast agreement by thousands of people over all these centuries, in memory of a dog only one of us could have met.Â
i loved that tile.Â
Every comment.
As anyone who has worked with wet clay knows, these pawprints could be removed with a dab more clay and a stroke of one hand.
That they werenât, says all that needs said.
The hand was too busy stroking something furry that purred or wagged its tail.
