Dave the Slave was an enslaved African-American potter who turned wares in the plantation potteries of Edgefield South Carolina before the Civil War. He made pottery from as early as the 1820’s to the mid-to-late 1860’s. Dave is famous mainly for two reasons. First, he had the ability to turn large pieces of pottery, forty gallons or more in size. This was an incredible feat. Secondly, he would sometimes write on the sides of his ware. It was against the law for slaves to learn to read and write in the antebellum South but Dave could and did. Dave sometimes wrote his name and date on his pottery and on very rare occasions he would write short two line couplets or short poems.