Page 114 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

56 Chinese Pottery and Porcelain

The yii tsan hua, rendered in Giles's Dictionary as the " tuberose,"
by Bushell as the " iris."

Clumps of chrysanthemum flowers.

Interlacing scrolls of mu-tan peony.

Ch'ang ch'un (long spring) flowers, identified by Bushell Avith the

" jasmine."

A " joyous meeting," symbolised according to Bushell by a pair

of magpies.

The Tartar pheasant {chai chih).

The season flowers supporting the characters ^i^fH^ cKien

k'un chHng fai, " Heaven and earth ff^ir and "
fruitful !

Monsters (shou) in sea waves.

Flying fish.

Historical scenes (ku shih), as well as genre subjects {jen wu).

Children playing with branches of flowers.

This last design occurs both in the form of belts of foliage scrolls,

among which are semi-nude boys, and of medallions with a boy

holding a branch, on blue and white and polychrome wares of the

late Ming period. But it is a design of considerable antiquity,

and it is found engraved on the early Corean bowls which, no doubt,

borrowed from Sung originals.

Though all these designs are given under the general heading
of blue and white, we may infer that the polychrome which is

occasionally mentioned was used in combination with the blue.
Thus the mention of " phoenixes in red clouds flying through flowers,"
of " nine red dragons in blue waves," and of " a pair of dragons

in red clouds," recalls actual specimens which I have seen of Lung

Ch'ing and Wan Li boxes with designs of blue dragons moving

through clouds touched in with iron red. Again, where the blue
designs are supplemented with " curling waves and plum blossoms

in polychrome {wu ts'ai),^^ one thinks of the well-known pattern

of conventional waves on which blossom and symbols are floating,

as on Plate 79. Other types of decoration mentioned are yellow

grounds and white glaze, both with dragon designs engraved under

the glaze {an hua), peacocks and mu-tan peonies in gilding, and

Amoulded ornament. specific example of the last are the lions

which served as knobs on the covers of the ovoid wine jars {t'an).

The author of the T'ao shuo pays a handsome tribute to the

Weskill of the late Ming potters. " find," he says, " that the

porcelain of the Ming dynasty daily increased in excellence till