The Rise and Fall of the Ceramic Spittoon can be charted at Stockspring Antiques in an exhibition of 60 pottery and porcelain examples that have been loaned from a private collection, one of which, seen right, is a Leeds creamware spittoon c.1800.
In what readers may be unsurprised to learn is the first exhibition of its type in the country, the show traces the spittoon's development and links to tobacco and chest diseases, from the earliest small hand-held examples of the 17th and 18th
centuries to the appearance of larger versions in public places and on to its 20th century decline once the association between public expectoration and infectious diseases was realised.
The show runs at 114 Kensington Church Street, London W8 from September 28-October 9. There is also an evening seminar, priced at £15, on October 7, featuring lectures on the Social History of Infectious Diseases in Europe by Dr Jim Stephenson, consultant microbiologist and on Ceramic Spittons by Dr Nigel Cooke, who is billed as a "Consultant Respiratory Physican and Ceramic nut".
Tel 020 7727 7995 for information.
