Page 225 - Catalogue of the Edward Morse collection of Japanese pottery MFA BOSTON

PROVINCE OF TOTOMI 147

PROVINCE OF TOTOMI

The pottery of this province up to within recent years has rigidly
adhered to the traditions of the tea-cult. It is absolutely without decora-
tion. Simple forms, quiet autumn browns and yellows for colors of glaze,
with surfaces like the inside of a nutshell, are among the characteristics of
this pottery. I have been unable to get records of the individual potters,
though there must have been many of them, as the work covers at least
three centuries. Yet, with rare exceptions, the pottery bears only the
impressed mark Shidoro.

SHIDORO (Case 16 and Plate XIV. 1708, 1710, 1711, 1734, 1738)
Pottery known as Shidoro has continued to be made since the time of Tokugawa
lyeyasu. Records show that this wise Shogun wrote to Enshu, of Shidoro, in 1589,
giving him permission to make pottery, and from that time to the present the mark
Shidoro has been used. As a matter of fact the oven was estabhshed at Yokuoka
village, not far from Shidoro, where the pottery had been made in ancient times.
The older forms, as in so many instances, are the finest, the latest specimens
being very poor. The only mark I have ever seen associated with Shidoro is that of
Tetsugi. This is found on a slender tea-jar with an age of forty or fifty years. Many
years before the time of Enshu a pottery was made, bearing an impressed mark
which has never been deciphered. Old books publish the mark, and Tokiko repeats it
with little resemblance to the original. The only two specimens of which I have any
record are in the collection. Ninagawa confessed to me that he had never seen a speci-
men, nor had he heard of the existence of one. Recent Shidoro covers two distinct
types : the one in the form of thin double gourd-shaped wine-bottles with medallion
decoration in black, unglazed or partially glazed with transparent green ; the other con-
sisting of heavy forms of deep cups or double gourd-shaped bottles with bright orange
and green glaze intermixed. These latter bear the impressed mark Shidoro.

1706. Jar. H. 8} in. Four looped handles. Fine gray-drab clay, rich light brown Seto
glaze, large irregular splashes of golden-brown glaze.
Mark indecipherable. 1500
1707. Jar. H. II in. Similar to last. Mark indeci-
pherable. 1500
Gift of Thomas E. Waggaman. '7o6 1707
1708. Jar, wide mouth. H. 2| in. Reddish-brown clay, transparent underglaze, splashes of
light fawn and olive-brown overglaze. Rosettes impressed on shoulder. 1670
Type Ninagawa. Part III., Fig. 15.
1709. Shallow tea-bowl. D. sf in. Dull ochre clay, warm brown glaze, nearly con-
1680
cealed by thick ochre glaze.