Pottery in Castandet

Castandet is famous, in this area, for its pottery production in the 19th century. When walking the dogs on Wednesday morning I met Mme Gourdon who is a fount of local knowledge. She started telling me about the pottery and I arranged to go and see her and some of the local pottery, along with Nigel, in the afternoon. We spent more than a couple of hours there looking at pottery which are now family heirlooms. The great-grandfather of M. Gourdon was a potter and some of his pieces are still in good condition. We also found out quite a bit more of the local history. The name Castandet apparently comes from the word "chataigne" which means chestnut tree or chestnuts. At one time the area was heavily wooded with chestnut trees. There is a chateau in the part of the village where the church and school are sited. The chateau was built in the late 19th century and is supposed to be a small reproduction of Chenonceaux, in the Loire. It was built by an engineer who had worked on the Panama canal and he also had the church built opposite the gates of his chateau so that he and his family and guests could walk out of the gates and straight across into the church.
The pottery industry in Castandet started in the early 19th century and died out in the early 20th century with the advent of enamel and aluminium. In 1874 there were at least 40 potteries in the village. Some residents, who were too poor to have their own oven were able to use the one at the chateau in return for giving the cinders to the chateau for use on the land.There are strata of specific types of clay, in the area, that were ideal for the type of pottery made. The manufacture was of kitchen utensils, plates, bowls, wine pichets, pots for preserving and water pots which the women of the village carried on their heads to go to the fountain to collect water. Not many cooking utensils were made. A major production was of pots, like small plant pots glazed inside, which were used to collect the resin from the pine trees. A considerable industry in the forested area of Les Landes.
There were about 40 ovens in Castandet many of them in our hamlet of Perron. Most of them have fallen into ruin or been demolished.There are still the remains of 2 of them in the centre of Perron. Our house was called, in those days, Peluchon or Peluzon and there was an oven here at the entrance to the property. An archaeological study was done in the village in 2004 and many samples of the pottery, mainly broken, were found. It is only recently that the importance of this industry has been realised. Mme Gourdon remembers that back in the 1950s there was a local fete in Perron and one of the side shows was of a rope strung over the road from which were hung various old pots which at that time were thought to be little more than rubbish. The pots were filled with prizes or water and the participants were blindfolded and given a hammer with which to smash the pots! They then recieved a prize or a waterfall. What sacrilage.