Page 128 - Chinese and japanese porcelain silk and lacquer Canepa

This Chapter relies on a wide variety of primary and secondary sources, this unknown light, smooth and translucent material began to arrive
which contain information relating to the porcelain trade as well as to the more regularly and in larger quantities in Renaissance Europe, it was
varied types and quantities of Chinese porcelain 1 imported into Western greatly valued.
Europe and the New World via the Atlantic and Pacific sea trade routes As in the previous Chapter concerning the trade in Chinese silk,
in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. It also relies on a vast excerpts from teatrises, accounts and letters written by Portuguese,
quantity of material evidence provided by both marine and terrestial Spanish, Italian, Dutch, English, French and German merchants and
archaeological finds from Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and English explorers, and clerics, as well as English and Spanish literary works,
shipwrecks, survival campsites, colonial settlements in Asia, the New provide descriptions and personal comments concerning the material
World and the Caribbean, as well as the respective mother countries in qualities and decorative schemes, and sometimes the purchase or sale
Western Europe. Whenever possible this material is complemented by price of the various types of porcelains imported into Western Europe
porcelain finds made at kiln sites in China, which serve to identify the and the New World as merchandise, private consignments or sent as
origin of the different types of porcelain imported, dating from the reigns gifts. Surviving bills of lading, ship registers, cargo manifests, shipment
of Zhengde (1506–1521) to Chongzhen (1628–1644). Archaeological receipts, memorandums, probate inventories, wills, judicial and notarized
finds from Chinese junks that sank during this period are also discussed documents, appraisals and auctions provide valuable information relating
as they provide further material evidence for the classification and dating to the commercial networks through which the imported porcelains
of the porcelain traded by the Europeans. circulated, and the way in which they were acquired, used and appreciated
China was not only renowned for its high quality silks as we saw in in the societies in Western Europe as well as in the multi-ethnic societies
the previous Chapter, but also for its fine porcelain. First manufactured in of the Spanish colonies, and of the Dutch and English colonies in the
the sixth century, porcelain was exported from the ninth century onwards 1 Unless otherwise specified, Chinese porcelain New World. More importantly, they show that by the early decades of
will the referred to as porcelain throughout this
to Japan, Southeast Asia, India, the Middle East and Africa. 2 Unlike doctoral dissertation. the seventeenth century in most countries of Western Europe as well as
silk, the highly vitrified porcelain was heavy enough to be stored deep 2 Rose Kerr, ‘Chinese Porcelain in Early European in the Spanish colonies in the New World, porcelain was highly valued
Collections’, in Jackson and Jaffer, 2004, p. 46.
in the hold of a ship, serving as ballast. It was predictable that a wooden 3 Brigadier, 2002, p. 54. and incorporated into the daily life not only of the nobility, clergy and
4 The travel account written by Marco Polo, Description
ship sailing upon rough seas would leak and items stored in the hold of the World, is the most comprehensive account of rich merchant class but also of individuals that belonged to lower levels of
China written by a European before the sixteenth
would get wet. Thus the impermeability of the vitrified porcelain body, century. Marco Polo described porcelain as ‘And again society, if only in small quantities. Visual sources, including still-life and
I tell you that the most beautiful vessels and plates of
which prevented it from being damaged by sea water, made it a popular porcelain, large and small, that one could describe are portrait paintings, drawings and prints serve to illustrate fairly accurately
ballast trade good. 3 Information about both the uniqueness and beauty made in great quantity in this aforesaid province in a not only the various types of porcelains imported, but also their practical
city which is called Tingui [Tongan, near Quanzhou]
of porcelain from China, which held the monopoly on the technique more beautiful that can be found in any other city. And and ornamental uses within these societies at a given time. Extant porcelain
on all sides they are much valued, for none of them are
of its production until the early seventeenth century, began to arrive in made in another place but in this city, and from there pieces in public and private collections around the world, some of them
they are carried to many places throughout the world.
Europe at the end of the thirteenth century after the Italian merchant And there is plenty there and a great sale, so great with datable metal mounts, provide tangible evidence of the porcelains
Marco Polo and other European travellers reached China during the time that for one Venetian groat you would actually have traded by the Europeans. Moreover, they help us visualize the differences
three bowls so beautiful that none would know how
of the Mongol rulers of the Yuan dynasty. 4 Only a few pieces of porcelain to devise them better’. Marco Polo, The Description of between the porcelains made to order for the Iberian market for both
the World, translated and annotated by A. C. Moule
are known to have reached Europe before 1500, either as gifts sent from and Paul Pelliot, London, 1938, Vol. 1, p. 352. Cited in secular and religious use during the early period of European trade with
Jean Michel Massing, ‘From Marco Polo to Manuel I.
the rulers of Egypt to the doges of Venice and the Medici in Florence, The European Fascination with Chinese Porcelain’, in China, with those made for the Dutch market for secular use during the
Levenson, 2009, p. 302.
or brought back from Asia by travellers. 5 Thus when porcelain made of 5 Kerr, 2004, p. 47; and Massing, 2009, p. 303. last decades of trade, before the Ming dynasty collapsed in 1644.

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