Page 152 - Chinese Porcelain Vol I, Galland

120 CHINESE PORCELAIN.

where the have handles and the none.
coffee-cups teacups
The cup as here drawn is " inverted pear " shape.
No. 125. A bowl. This the most
semispherical being
usual shape, it is known in auction catalogues simply by the
term " bowl." These were used as Some
largely punch-bowls.
are as No. 121, others are more in
"bell-shaped," cylindrical
" "
shape. These are known as cylindrical," or flat" bowls, the
former and the latter shallow.
being deep
Vases.
In dealing with vases, beakers, and jars, the shapes run so
into one another that it is often difficult to say where the jar
ends and the vase begins, while in the same way beakers and
vases mixed at times, and in such cases the best
get very way
to describe the to admit the
piece is probably just difficulty.
Following the dictionary definition, a jar has a broad and a
bottle a narrow mouth ; but still it is often impossible, unless
we know the for which the vessel was intended, to
purpose say
to which class it belongs.
It is desirable, as far as possible, to make one or two words
convey an adequate idea as to the shape of the piece, and the
terms generally employed for this purpose are cylindrical,
bulbous, oviform, pear-shaped, conical, oval, etc. The top of
an egg is the thick part, so that oviform vases are largest at
the and smallest at the bottom. The same be said of
top may
cones, only they are more elongated and not so convex in form.
Pears, on the other hand, are narrow at the top, where the stalk
is, and wide at the base. It may be necessary sometimes to
refer to these as " inverted." Bulbs are of
shapes irregular
and the term bulbous at least serves to show that the
shape,
vessel is of rounded form, but does not come under the defini-
tions of circular or oval. The drawback to this method
only
is that it does not indicate whether the necks are
long or short,
and whether the egg and cone shapes, which cannot stand alone,
are supported by spreading bases, or have the bottom part cut
off so as to arrive at a flat surface, on which
they will stand,
therefore the seems to be, where exactness is neces-
only plan
to add such further information as here in
sary, is given
parentheses.
No. 126. vase stand and
Cylindrical (with upright flange