Page 317 - Oriental Series Japan and China, Brinkly

MONOCHROMATIC GLAZES

sides not being curved, but sloping rapidly to the

base, which is very small in proportion to the circum-

ference of the upper rim. The porcelain is exceed-

ingly thin and delicate, and the pure white of the
glaze offers an immediate contrast to the opaque
mellow tone of the Ting-yao. These specimens have

decoration either incised or in relief, the usual designs

being dragons or phoenixes (or both together) among

clouds, or floral sprays. So fine is the technique that
in the case of incised decoration it is often necessary
to look through the piece by sunlight in order to see

the design. On the bottom of genuine specimens,

inside the bowl, the year-mark ( Ta-Ming Tung-lo nien

chi) is always found, either engraved or in relief, in

seal character. The glaze, though smooth and

shining, does not present the solid glossy or oily ap-
pearance so often seen in choice Chinese porcelain.

This point is worthy of note, for it constitutes a dis-
tinguishing feature between the Tung-lo white porce-

lain and that of the Kang-hsi and Chien-lung eras of

the present dynasty.

In addition to the fact that the student is hence-

forth confronted by soft-paste and hard-paste porce-

lains, between which careless or ignorant writers fail

altogether to distinguish, he finds now another source

of confusion in the name applied to the new To-tai-ki.

The Yuan potters' wimairteat"ion(Sohfu-tfhue-ySauo}n,g Ting-yao was
"
called imperial and to the

Tung-lo hard-paste porcelain the appellation Kuan-

yao, or "official ware" was given. It is necessary,

therefore, to warn amateurs against confounding the

Kuan-yao of the Ming and Tsing dynasties with the

similarly called and similarly written Kuan-yao of

the Sung dynasty, which, as shown in a previous