Page 478 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

302 Chinese Pottery and Porcelain

in the place of the mark. Many instances have already been noted

in the chapters dealing with Ming porcelains, such as fu kuei k'ang
ning (riches, honours, peace and serenity), ch'ang ming fu kuei (long
life, riches and honours), etc., see vol. i., p. 225. The most frequent
of these characters is shou (longevity), which is written in a great
variety of fanciful forms, mostly of the seal type. The " hundred
forms of shou " sometimes constitute the sole decoration of a vase;
and as already observed ^ the swastika {wan) is sometimes combined
with the circular form of the seal character shou to make the wan

shou symbol of ten thousand longevities, Fu (happiness) and lu

(preferment) also occur, though less frequently.

Buddhistic inscriptions are usually in Sanskrit characters, but

we find occasional phrases such as THen chu en po ^-^J^l^ (pro-

^pitious waves from India) and Fo ming ch'ang jih f^ S^ (the

ever bright Buddha) in ordinary script or seal, one character in each

of four medallions ; and the sacred name of O mi Vo fo psfjgpg^,
Amida Buddha, similarly applied, would serve as a charm against

evil.

In addition to the central designs, there is a number of secondary
ornaments which round off the decoration of a piece of porcelain.
Chief of these are the border patterns, of which a few favourites
may be exemplified. At the head of the list comes the Greek key-
fret or meander (see Plate 12, Fig. 1), which, like the swastika, is
of world-wide use. On the ancient bronze this pattern was freely
used both in borders and as a diaper background, and it is de-
scribed by Chinese archaeologists as the " cloud and thunder pat-
tern." It is sometimes varied by the inclusion of the swastika, in
which case it is known as the swastika fret. Another bronze pat-
tern freely borrowed by the porcelain decoration is the border of
stiff plantain leaves which appears appropriately on the neck or
stem of an upright vase (see Plate 89, Fig. 1).

The border of small " S " shaped scrolls is apparently derived
from silkworm cocoons ; but the curled scrolls and another scroll
pattern with more elaborate curves are intended to suggest clouds.

A further development of the cloud pattern is scarcely distinguishable

from the ju-i head border (see Plate 77, Fig. 2). Indeed the terms,
" connected cloud " pattern, ju-i cloud pattern, and ju-i head pat-
tern, are used almost interchangeably by Chinese archaeologists.

Conventional waves are represented by a kind of shaded scale

1 See p. 299.