Page 71 - J. P Morgan Collection of Chinese Art and Porcelain

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION

(8) sky blue, (9) furnace transmutations (yao-pien),
or flambes. These were all reproduced in due course
during the first half of the eighteenth century on por-

celain, and the new white body was in marked contrast,
we are told, with the sandy, ill-levigated paste of the

original pieces.

The only remaining porcelain ware of the Sung dy-
nasty which requires a word of notice is the Chien yao,
produced in the province of Fuhkien, where the black-

enamelled cups with spreading sides, so highly appre-
ciated for the tea ceremonial of the time, were made.

The lustrous black coat of these cups was speckled and

dappled all over with spots of silvery white, simulating
the fur of a hare or the breast of a gray partridge,
hence the names of "hare's fur cups," and "partridge
cups," given them by connoisseurs. These little

tea cups were valued also by the Japanese at immense
prices, and were mounted by them with silver rims and
cunningly pieced together when broken with gold

lacquer.

The more recent Chien yao, it must be noted, which
has been fabricated since the time of the Ming dynasty
at Te-hua, in the same province, is altogether different
from the Chien yao of the Sung which has just been
described, being the velvety white porcelain sometimes
known as hlanc de Chine.

MING DYNASTY (1368-1643)

The Ming dynasty is famous in the annals of Chinese
ceramic art, which made such great advances under

its rule that in the reign of Wan-li, as the native

writers say, there was nothing that could not be made

of porcelain.

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