Page 45 - Catalogue of the Edward Morse collection of Japanese pottery MFA BOSTON

THE CATALOGUE

KOREAN POTTERY

The Japanese give the fullest credit to Korea for many influences
derived from Korean potters in past times. For this reason a small col-
lection of Korean pottery has been brought together to show in a measure
what the Japanese really owe to Korea. The hard, lathe-turned, unglazed
mortuary pottery of a thousand years ago has been derived outright from
Korea. The Japanese identify specimens dug up in Japan as Korean.
From the wide distribution of this pottery in Japan, and its abundance as
seen in the fragments along the roadways, I am convinced that it was made
in Japan, but by Korean potters. I am forced to this conclusion by the
absolute identity in clay, form, decoration, and purpose.
In Korea as in Japan this hard, lathe-turned pottery is associated with
a hand-made pottery of light, sandy clay, either red or yellowish in color.
Korean potters came to Japan at various times, centuries before they were
compelled to by Hideyoshi and his generals, and followed the vocation of
making mortuary vessels as well as pottery for domestic use. Provincial
history records the coming of Korean potters to various southern provinces,
notably Hizen, Satsuma, Higo, Suo, and Buzen, and even as far north as
Musashi. A peculiar style of decoration consists of impressed or incised
figures, usually in the form of stars, rosettes, circles, lines, etc., which being
filled with white clay, rarely black, give a simple and enduring decoration
under the glaze. The Japanese call this style Mishima, and it is directly
traceable to Korea. I have elsewhere shown that wherever Korean potters
settled in Japan the Mishima style of decoration is seen. This form was
undoubtedly an outgrowth of the incised decoration found on the mortuary
pottery. Roughly cut notches in the basal ring of bowls are said to be of
Korean origin.
Aside from the above-mentioned features, unless we add the deep_olive-
green glazes of early Satsuma and the discovery of white clay in Osumi
by Korean potters, and possibly the early Raku glaze, I am not aware of