Page 365 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

Yung Cheng Period (1723-1735) 219

or jujube red, a softer and more vitreous ^ variety of the same colour

which Dr. Bushell considered to have originated in the Yung Cheng

period. On the souffle red under the glaze we may quote Bushell's

remarks ^ " Two of the colours especially characteristic of the
:

Nien yao or ' Nien porcelain ' of this epoch are the clair de lune or

yiXeh pai, and the bright souffle copper red." The latter is further
described on a vase in the Walters collection " exhibiting the

characteristic monochrome glaze of bright ruby red tint, and stippled

surface. The souffle glaze is applied over the whole surface with

the exception of a panel of irregular outline reserved on one side,

where it is shaded off so that the red fades gradually into a nearly

white ground." This panel was afterwards filled in with a design

Ain overglaze enamels. tazza in the British Museum has this same

red covering three-quarters of the exterior, and fading into the

white ground. This red also occurs in its beautiful translucent

ruby tints on a pair of small wine cups in the same collection, and

on a set of larger cups belonging to Mr. Eumorfopoulos. One would

say it was the "liquid dawn" tint of the celebrated wine cups of

the late Ming potter, Hao Shih-chiu.

The clair de lune or moon white {yiieh pai), an exquisite glaze

of palest blue, is illustrated on Plate 130. It is often faintly tinged

with lavender which bears out its description in the Imperial list ^

" This colour somewhat resembles the Ta Kuan glaze, but the body

of the ware is white. The glaze is %vithout crackle, and there are

—two shades pale and dark." The Kuan glaze, it should be ex-

plained, was characterised by a reddish tinge.

In addition to the foreign colours which were capable of being

used as monochromes as well as in painted designs, there are a few

other new glazes named in the Imperial list. The /a ch'ing (cloisonne

blue) which " resulted from recent experiments to match " the

deep blue of the enamellers on copper, is identified by Bushell with

the dark sapphire blue known as pao shih Ian (precious stone blue).

It was, we are told, darker and bluer than the purplish chi ch'ing,

and it had not the orange peel and palm eye markings of the latter.

It has, however, a faint crackle, and is apparentlj'^ a glaze of the

^ In the jujube red the iron oxide is mixed with the plumbo-alcaline flux of the

enameller, whereas in the mo hung it is simply made to adhere to the porcelain by
means of glue, and depends for the silicates, which give it a vitreous appearance, on

the glaze beneath it.

2 0. C. A., p. 360.
3 See p. 224, No. 18.