Page 55 - J. P Morgan Collection of Chinese Art and Porcelain

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION

dynasty, after his conquest of China in the twelfth
century b. c, is recorded to have sought out a lineal
descendant of the emperor Shun, on account of his
hereditary skill in the fabrication of pottery, and to

have given him his own eldest daughter in marriage,
endowed with the fief of the State of Ch'en, now Ch'en-

chou in the province of Honan, to keep up there the an-
cestral worship of his accomplished ancestor.

There are many other references to pottery in the
old books of the Chou dynasty. The K'ao Kiing Chi,

a contemporary official work on the industries of the
period, has a short section on the pottery made for
the public markets, which gives the names and meas-
urements of several kinds of cooking vessels, sacrifi-
cial vases and platters, in the fabrication of which the
processes of throwing on the wheel and pressing in
moulds are clearly distinguished. The different ves-
sels were made by two classes of craftsmen, called
respectively t'ao jen, (potters,) and fa7ig jen, (mould-

—ers). The early objects of pottery unearthed in China

are remarkably similar in form, as well as in ornamental
details, with the corresponding utensils of bronze,
which are less perishable and so better known. Clay
was, doubtless, the earliest material used for meat

offerings and libations of wine in ancestral worship,

and, though supplanted by bronze among the rich,

it is still retained in the ritual of the poor.

Pottery of the Chou dynasty is occasionally found
incised with dedicatory inscriptions of the same char-
acter as those on the contemporary bronzes, and is
also used by archaeologists in their study of the an-
cient script. But it was not till the former Han dy-
nasty, just before the Christian era, that dates began
to appear, impressed generally by a stamp under the
foot of the piece, giving the title of the reign and the
year, with the addition, perhaps, of its cyclical number.
Bricks and tiles intended for the palaces of the Ch'in

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