Page 111 - Oriental Series Japan and China, Brinkly

THE CELADON

originals. Unfortunately, no accurate information is

obtainable as to the time when the factory at Ch'u-
chou-fu ceased to be active. The date may, however,

be approximately fixed at the early part of the six-

Upteenth century. to that time the characteristic

iron-red pate and thick, lustrous glaze of the Lung-

Achuan-yao were produced without much difficulty.

little later, during the Wan-li era (15731619), there

flourished an expert nicknamed Hu-kung (Mr. Pots),
or Hu-yin-tao-jen (the Taoist hidden in a pot), whose

reproductions of the Kuan-yao and Ko-yao celadons

of the Sung dynasty enjoyed considerable reputation.

He appears to have shown some want of strength in

respect of crackle, but his work was sufficiently ex-

cellent to make his name remembered, a fact from

which it may safely be inferred that the manufacture

of celadons of the old type had ceased to be carried

on successfully before his time. Tradition says that
he marked his pieces Hu-yin-tao-jen, but if this be so
they must have been at once distinguishable from

their prototypes.

Contemporaneous with, or perhaps a little earlier

than, Hu-kung, an artist named Ngeu, who worked

at the factory of Yi-hsing (a place situated on the

western shore of the Tai-wu Lake, some few miles

inland from Shanghai), is recorded as having imitated
the ancient Ko-yao and Kuan-yao celadons. His ware

was known as Ngeu-yao.
Neither of these manufactures possesses much

practical interest except as showing that, at the

close of the sixteenth century, celadons of the

recognised class had become so difficult of pro-
duction that skilled artists acquired permanent fame

by imitating them. It is not to be supposed, of

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