Page 53 - Catalogue of the Edward Morse collection of Japanese pottery MFA BOSTON

JAPANESE POTTERY 31

89—92- Bowls, with gray glaze and white Mishima decoration. 1630-1780
93~IOI« Bowls, flask, jars, and nozzle bottle. i 750-1800

KOREAN POTTERY — MODERN (Case i)
I02-H2. Jars, bottles, and cups. 1850-1880

JAPANESE POTTERY

The earliest records of the Japanese attest to the presence of the potter's
art. Before recorded history, however, or dimmest tradition, man was
engaged in fashioning rude pottery by hand, and the wide dispersal of this
material has led to a number of provinces claiming equal antiquity for the
origin of pottery-making. The shell heaps along the coast are filled with
the fragments of rude pots, showing cord-marked, incised, and modeled
decoration, indicating the presence, in prehistoric times, of a people low
down in savagery, yet skilful in handling clay. Early in historic times
may be regarded the clay figures, the burial of which on the death of an
emperor is said to have been substituted for that of living persons. The
record seems childish, and as the date is early in the Christian era it may be
that the story might have originated from the finding of these figures, or
that the legend might have come from abroad. Next in time are the
unglazed lathe-turned mortuary vessels found in caves, dolmens and tumuli,
associated with bronze objects, indicating an age of from eleven hundred to
twelve hundred years. The collections in the great storehouse at Nara
reveal the existence of soft green glazed pottery one thousand years ago,
though Ninagawa was inclined to believe that this pottery was brought
from China, and I am inclined to the same opinion. Fragments of a hard
green glazed pottery dug up in Omi are figured by Ninagawa and accorded
an age of nine hundred years. Records show the presence of Korean
potters in Hizen five hundred years ago.
The first step in what may be called a definite and connected history of
pottery-making in Japan dates from the beginning of the thirteenth cen-
tury. The drinking of powdered tea was destined to exercise a profound
influence on the potter's art. An herb which was so associated with
Chinese courtesy and hospitality — an infusion which had inspired the
minds of those who had been identified with the national grandeur of that
unique people — was to be served in vessels of becoming excellence. With
the importation of pottery and porcelain from China the desire to improve