Page 60 - Oriental Series Japan and China, Brinkly

CHINA

which and other evidences it may safely be inferred

that there is here no question of translucid porcelain.

Indeed, the statement may be made at once that all the

choice celadons of the Sung, the Yuan, and even the

Ming dynasties were stone-ware, showing considerable

variation in respect to fineness of pate and thinness of

biscuit, but never becoming true translucid porcelain.

Of course the conclusion is not to be drawn that

to manufacture translucid porcelain was beyond the

keramic competence of the time. On the contrary,

an opaque pate seems to have been deliberately pre-

ferred as a suitable basis for Ching-tsu (green-coloured)

glaze. It is exceedingly probable that, like all early-

period celadons , that Ju-yao had pate which was white

except at places directly exposed to the heat of the

kiln that, in short, its clay, when not protected by the
;

glaze, assumed a red, or red-brown tinge in the oven.

Paucity of authenticated specimens precludes absolute

certainty about these points. Japanese connoisseurs
maintain, however, that this so-called
" iron "
base

is not necessarily found in the best examples of yu-

yao, though it does constitute a mark of authenticity

in the case of early celadons generally. Reference

will be made to the point hereafter. The glaze of

the yu-yao presented great merits. It was so soft

and lustrous that connoisseurs compared it to con-

gealed fat. Its colour varied from a green almost

verging upon a blue to white barely tinged with

green. Very frequently the surface was crackled
;

sometimes it was entirely without crackle, speci-

mens of the latter character being most highly

prized. In the Tao-lu it is stated that the crackle

of the yu-yao was of two varieties. In the first case

the surface was covered with a network of close, cir-

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