Page 45 - Export Porcelain and Globakization- GOOD READ

Pic. 20: Map of the Harbor of Nagasaki and Dejima Island, Copper engraving by
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Bellin 1764

The Dutch, from 1659 to the mid-18th century, facilitated the trade of Arita
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porcelain to Europe and together with Chinese junks also within Asia . The first
Dutch order of 35,000 pieces of Japanese porcelain was for the Ottoman marketplace
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in Mocha . The first import to Europe took place in 1660. Dutch traders were
explicitly asking for porcelain in the Chinese Kraak style.
Pic. 21: Japanese Kraak style plate with the VOC coat of arms

And indeed, the Arita blue and white porcelain (called “sometsuke” in Japanese,
see plate 173) was in many cases an imitation of either Chinese products or even
Dutch Delft Faience sent to the Japanese potters as reference pieces. The beginning of
the Dutch-Japanese porcelain trade was not very successful: according to T. Volker a
total of 190,000 pieces were shipped to Europe from 1660 until 1683 – when China
came to the market again. Taking into consideration the monopoly the Japanese had
on Asian ceramics for these two and a half decades this was a small number of pieces.
It seems that the Dutch customers were somehow comparably satisfied with their
Delft products – even not being hard and translucent porcelain but soft, coarse and
easy breakable white covered earthenware. Since the Delft Faience were imitations of
Chinese Ming and Qing porcelains we could actually describe some Japanese blue
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