Page 294 - Chinese porcelains collected by Mr. and Mrs. Charles P. Taft, Cincinnati, Ohio, by John Getz
P. 294
GLOSSARY
until the material is thoroughly compact, after Lao TSZE, or SHOU-LAO, the founder of the
which it is made into small bricks like the " pe- Taoist system of philosophy. Born under a
tun-tse." These bricks are marked or stamped
by the makers, and sold in this shape to the plum-tree (" Li "), he is said to have taken this
ceramist ; but Pere d'EntrecoUes stated that as a surname. According to some Chinese
sometimes counterfeit marks were put upon an
records he became incarnate 321 1 B.C., while
inferior article. other accounts state that he was bom in the
Kiln, a porceladn furnace : called in China second month of the dragon year and period
" Chao-yao."
Wuof Ting 1324-1265 B.C.
KlNG-ll-CHiN (Mandarin) : town in which the
most important factories are situated. See page Other particulars of his life which are con-
xviii. sidered authentic state that he was the keeper
KUAN-YIN, or KWAN-YIN, the goddess called of records at Lo, a capital during the Chou
" Queen of Heaven." Her name means
dynasty, about the close of the sixth century
" Hearer of Prayers." Kuan-yin is believed to
share with Amitibha the dominion of the Para- B.C., and professed a doctrine of abstraction
dise in the West. This Bodhisatt\'a, according
to Chinese theories, is of native origin, and was from worldly cares based upon speculations re-
originally the daughter of a king of the (first)
Chou dynasty (690 B.C.), a date preceding garding Reason (Tao) and Virtue (Te). It is
the introduction in China of Buddhism from
India. Maternal images of this goddess hold- stated that this excited the curiosity of Confu-
ing a child are ohen met with in ceranuc art.
cius, who is said to have visited LaoTsze, and to
KY-LIN, or Ch'-LIN, a generic name of one of
the four supernatural creatures of Chinese have retired disconcerted at his bold flights of
Buddhistic tradition : an emblem of good gov-
imagination. (The statement regarding this
"
ernment and long life. It is called " unicorn meeting is, however, open to doubt.) After a
long period of service, Lao Tsze is said to have
when represented with a horn. There are sev-
eral varieties of this curious and legendary ani- retired to the West, after confiding a written
mal. It is supposed to appear only \vhen wise
cind just rulers or great men, like Confucius, are statement of his philosophy to a keeper of a
bom, and, with the Feng-hujmg and the red
fox, is considered to be of good omen. Said frontier pass of Han Ku, named Yin Hsi.
" to tread so lightly as, to leave no footprints,
so cautiously as to crush no living creature." Later mystics improved upon this account of
This animal is said to attain the age of a thou- his " classic of Reason and Virtue " by assign-
sand years, and is looked upon as the head of
ing a period of mythical antiquity and a mirac-
hairy animals. It is depicted with character-
ulous conception, through the influence of a
istics of many different creatures, being some-
rimes shown with scaly hide, hoofs and legs like star, to Lao Tsze's birth.
a deer, and a tufted tail ; the shoulders bearing
flame-like appendages significant of its divine According to the various accounts, he has
nature. Its appellation, Ky-lin, is compounded
from Ki, the male, and Lin, the female animal. lived for many centuries. His professed dis-
ciples, Lieh Tse and Chuang Tze (in the fourth
Lace Pattern. See Vandyke Pattern. century B.C.), and Hai Nan Tze (in the second
LANG-YAO, a Chinese term for sang-de-bceuf
century B.C.), progressively developed the mys-
porcelain, technically the most perfect of its
cljiss : named after the famous potter, Lang- tic element thus introduced, and a notable im-
ting-so, who was later a director of the Impe- petus accrued to it from the superstitious belief
rial factory at King-te-chen under the Emperor
with which the pretensions of the alchemists
K"ang-hsi.
Wuwere received by the Emperor Ti, from
whose period onward the reverence paid to the
founder began to assume a divine character.
In 666 A.D. he was for the first rime ranked
among the gods, being canonized by the Em-
peror as the " Great Supreme," the " Emperor
of the Dark First Cause," and his title was
again enlarged in 1013.
The achievement of corporeal immortality
having been the chief aim of the sect named
after him, the founder, Lao Tsze, naturally came
to be considered the " God of Longevity," and
as such he figures in paintings, and very fre-
quently also on porcelains, being usually depicted
as an aged man leaning upon a staff. He may
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