Page 236 - Chinese and japanese porcelain silk and lacquer Canepa

and globular or elephant-shaped kendis, are thus far recorded for the first time in a
shipwreck in 1600, on the cargo of the San Diego. The quality of the Kraak porcelain in
most cargoes was mixed, ranging from very fine to rather crude. A change to simplified
methods of production at the private kilns of Jingdezhen over time seems evident, as
many pieces in the earlier cargoes were moulded but by the late 1630s, pieces had no
longer moulded decoration. From the very beginning the cargoes included a small
Figs. 3.3.1.1.12a and b Fragment of a quantity of the cruder blue-and-white porcelain made at the private kilns of Zhangzhou,
blue-and-white bowl from an unidentified
shipwreck, known as Angra D (early of both open and closed forms. Furthermore, Kinrande and other porcelains decorated
seventeenth century) with overglaze enamels appear to have been imported only in small amounts, and
Jingdezhen kilns, Jiangxi province not regularly. It is unclear if this was due to the tastes of the multi-ethnic clientele in
Ming dynasty, Wanli/Tianqi reign (1573–1627)
Centro de História de Além-Mar (CHAM), the New World, or the amount of porcelain with colour overglaze enamel decoration
Universidade Nova de Lisboa
brought to Manila by the Chinese junk traders and Portuguese.
As noted in section 1.1.2 of Chapter I, after the Manila Galleon reached Acapulco
in the mid-December, the porcelain alongside other Chinese goods (including silk, as
Research has brought to light a few shards of blue-and-white porcelain recovered shown in Chapter II), were sold at the annual wholesale and retail fair that was held
from an unidentified shipwreck, known as Angra D, in Angra do Heroísmo Bay in in Acapulco in the month of February, which was attended by merchants from both
632 See Canepa, 2010, figs. 10 and 7, respectively.
Terceira, Azores, which played an important role in both Spanish and Portuguese 633 Mentioned in Canepa, 2011/1, pp. 60–61. viceroyalties, New Spain and Peru. Most of the porcelain, intended for consumption
634 Two years later, the galleon Jesus Maria while
maritime trade routes (Appendix 3). These include a shard that most probably sailing from Acapulco to Guam, and then to Cavite, in New Spain, was carried inland on an arduous mule train over the mountains to
643
formed part of the rim of a Jingdezhen plate of rather ordinary quality with a phoenix rescued 260 survivors of the Santa Margarita. Fish, Mexico City, where it was sold in the city market housed in a building southeast of
2011, p. 499.
design within a diamond and trigram border, similar those discussed earlier that were 635 I am grateful to Jack Harbeston, IOTA Partners, the cathedral (present-day Zócalo area, the historic centre of the city). The exotic
for providing me with images of the porcelain
recovered from Spanish shipwrecks and excavated at Lagos in southern Portugal. This recovered from the shipwreck. nature, beauty, translucense and durability of the porcelain made it a highly desirable
shipwreck, believed to be a Spanish ship that sunk in the beginning of the seventeenth 636 Personal communication with Jack Harbeston, commodity and thus coveted not only by the Spanish colonial elite, clergy and
December 2007.
century, also yielded a fragment of the base of a bowl bearing the mark Da Ming 637 William M. Mathers, Henry S. Parker III, PhD, and wealthy merchant class of New Spain but also by other residents of lower socio-
Kathleen A. Copus (eds.), Archaeological Report.
nian zao (Made in the Great Ming dynasty), made at a private Jingdezhen kiln The Recovery Of The Manila Galleon Nuestra economic classes.
(Figs. 3.3.1.1.12a and b) (Appendices 2 and 3). 644 Señora de la Concepción, Pacific Sea Resources, Textual sources provide important evidence of a large-scale consumption of
Sutton, 1990; William M. Mathers, ‘Nuestra Señora
Additional material evidence of the various types of porcelain imported into New de la Concepción’, National Geographic, vol. 178, porcelain among the multi-ethnic colonial society of Mexico City, in contrast to what
No. 3, September 1990, pp. 39–53; Maura Rinaldi,
Spain is provided by a large number of porcelain shards that have been excavated in ‘The Ceramic Cargo of the Nuestra Señora de la we saw ocurred in Madrid, Seville and other urban cities of Spain. Probate inventories
Manila. Finds include both Jingdezhen and Zhangzhou porcelain ranging from high to Concepción’, Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic of the belongings of 128 residents of the city dating from 1580 to 1630 recently studied
Society, Vol. 57, 1992–1993, pp. 95–96; and William
rather low quality. Shards that formed part of a variety of Kraak bowls, dishes, saucer M. Mathers and Nancy Shaw, Treasure of the by Gasch-Tomás have shown that almost 24.2 percent include porcelain, giving an
Concepción, Hong Kong, 1993.
dishes and plates with continuous or panelled rim borders, shards of saucer dishes with 638 Maura Rinaldi, ‘The Ceramic Cargo of the average of 13 pieces of porcelain per inventory. The study also revealed that around
648
white or blue lotus-petal borders as well as shards of rectangular or oval covered boxes Concepción’, in Mathers, Parker III, and Copus, 645 Takenori Nogami, Wilfredo P. Ronquillo, Alfredo 80 percent of the inventories of individuals with patrimonies valued in 100,000 to
1990, pp. 406-418, pls. 3a, 6a, b, c and d, 8a, b and c, B. Orogo, Nida T. Cuevas and Kazuhiko Tanaka,
were excavated from three sites in Intramuros: the Ayuntamiento, the Baston de San 10a and b, 12, 13a, b and c, 14a and b, 15a and b, 16a ‘Porcelains from Manila in Spanish Philippines’, 1,000,000 maravedís who belonged to the elites or at least were well-to-do residents,
and b, 17a and b, and 20a. Departmental Bulletin Paper, Kanazawa University,
Diego and the Parian sites. 645 These sites also yielded shards of Zhangzhou blue-and- 639 Ibid., pp. 418–419, pl. 21a. No. 28, 2006, pp. 39–51, figs. 7–20. I am greatly such as craftsmen and bureaucrats, had Asian goods; and that most inventories
white dishes, saucer dishes and plates, as well as of dishes decorated with overglaze 640 This is further suggested by the fact that many indebted to Nogami Takenori, Arita History and valued at 50,000 to 100,000 maravedís had at least 1 Asian commodity. These data
649
bases of the cups found bear apocryphal Chenghua Folklore Museum, Japan, for providing me with
enamels or with raised white porcelain clay slip on a pale greenish-white celadon reign marks like those recovered from the other two research material on the excavations carried out in indicate that porcelain and other Asian goods imported into New Spain were more
shipwrecks. Ibid., p. 419, pl. 22a and b and 23a and b. Manila in 2004–2005.
glaze. 646 In the north of Isla Hermosa (present-day Taiwan), which was occupied by 641 Ibid., p. 427, pls. 30a and b. 646 bid., pp. 40–42, figs. 8–10, p. 44, fig. 12, p. 48, fig. 16, numerous and cheaper than in Spain (Seville, for example), and that the demand was
I
the Spanish from 1626 to 1646, there was a casual find of a Kraak shard. This 642 Ibid., pp. 428–429, pls. 40a and b. and p. 51, fig. 20. more diversified among social classes in Mexico City. According to Gasch-Tomás
647
650
I
643 I am grateful to Catarina Garcia for providing me 647 n 1626, the Spanish established a settlement and
shard, unearthed in the vicinity of Fort Santo Domingo at Tamsui, shows a similar with images of the porcelain shards recovered built Fort San Salvador at Keelung, incorporating over 50 percent of the Spaniards and Creoles of Mexico City consumed Asian goods,
from the shipwreck. The shards are tiny, thus it is Isla Hermosa in the Manila-Acapulco trade route.
rim decoration to that of a dish reconstructed from shards recovered from the Nuestra very difficult to identify the type of pieces that they Three years later, they built Fort San Domingo at which would have belonged to the highest elites such as noblemen, clergymen and
Señora de la Limpia y Pura Concepción (1641) and the Hatcher junk (c.1643). This originally formed part. Tamsui on the north-western coast of the island. wholesale merchants; and middle elites such as Crown employees, craftsmen, low
644 I am grateful to José Bettencourt and Catarina In 1642, however, the Dutch who were at war with
suggests that Kraak was among the porcelain purchased by the Spanish in Isla Hermosa Garcia, Centro de História de Além-Mar (CHAM), the Spanish over the Moluccas, expelled them from and middle merchants, shopkeepers, professionals, and even some poor residents. 651
Universidade Nova de Lisboa, for providing me with Keelung and temporarily took over the island. I am
to be shipped to Manila, and then via the trans-Pacific trade route to New Spain and information on the Agra D shipwreck, and images grateful to Tai-kang Lu, Tainan National University This high level of porcelain consumption in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth
subsequently re-exported via the trans-Atlatic trade route to Spain. of the porcelain recovered from the wreck site. The of the Arts, for providing me with information and centuries, as demonstrated by both Gasch-Tomás and Krahe, was unattainable in
shard is published in Catarina Garcia, ‘Preliminary images of the porcelain found in Taiwan.
To sum up, the overwhelming majority of the porcelain imported into New Spain assessment of the daily life on board an Iberian ship 648 Gasch-Tomás, 2012, p. 260, Table 6.3 and p. 262. Spain. Interestingly, the data provided by Gasch-Tomás show that the middle elites
from the beginning of the 17th century (Terceira, 649 Ibid., pp. 268–269.
by the Manila Galleons in the last decades of the sixteenth and early seventeenth century Açores)’, in Marinella Pasquinucci and Timm Welski 650 Ibid., p. 269. of both Mexico City and Seville acquired more pieces of porcelain than the wealthiest
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was blue-and-white porcelain from Jingdezhen. Most consisted of Kraak porcelain of (eds.), Close Encounters: Sea- and Riverborne 651 t is important to consider, however, that the elites. The reason for this may partly lie in the tastes of the wealthiest elites of New
Trade, Ports and Hinterlands, Ship Construction inventories only show the belongings of the white
open forms, including dishes, saucer dishes, plates and bowls of various sizes. Closed and Navigation in Antiquity, the Middle Ages and residents of Mexico City, as mestizos, mulattoes and Spain, who as the members of the royal court back in Spain, preferred to acquire
in Modern Time, BAR International Series 1283, indigenous people did not make inventories when
forms, such as covered boxes, pear-shaped bottles, jars, pomegranate-shaped ewers Oxford, 2004, p. 168, fig. 10. they died. Gasch-Tomás, 2012, p. 270. tableware made of silver rather than of porcelain to both use at their dining tables and

234 Silk, Porcelain and Lacquer Trade in Chinese Porcelain 235