Page 245 - Chinese and japanese porcelain silk and lacquer Canepa

one of the Portuguese ships that sailed there to trade. Although ceramics accounted
to over 90 percent of the material excavated from the remains of two domestic sites at
Puerto Real on the northern coast of Hispaniola (present-day Haiti), known as Locus
33/35 and 19, they only yielded a small number of shards of finely potted blue-and-
white porcelain. Forty-five shards were found at Locus 19, and ten at Locus 33–35,
both of which appear to have been upper-status residence households. The settlement’s
isolation and the frequent attacks by privateers, led to the official abandonment of
Puerto Real in 1603. Thus the Spanish colonists must have acquired the porcelain
719
sometime before they abandoned the site. It is likely that the porcelain had been
720
imported via Veracruz.
Excavations undertaken at various sites in the port city of Havana (present-
day Cuba), an important stopover for the ships of the Spanish Treasure Fleet before
beginning the eastward voyage via the Atlantic to Spain, have demonstrated that some
of the porcelain carried by these ships was destined to this colonial market. The site
of the Plaza de Armas yielded shards of a plate with blue-and-white and overglaze
red enamel decoration, thus of Kinrande type; a fragment of a Kraak plate with a
continuous naturalistic rim border and a blue-and-white cup. The site of a colonial
house in Calvo de la Puerta, the Casa de Obrapía, located in area of Old Havana in
the intersections of Obrapía and Mercaderes streets, yielded a considerable quantity 717 Published in Linda R. Shulsky, ‘A Chinese Porcelain
of ceramic material of various origins, including over 200 porcelain shards. These Bowl found in Concepción de la Vega’, Oriental Art,
721
Vol. XLVII, no. 2 (2001), p. 63, figs. 2–6.
include shards of various blue-and-white bowls, some of the chi-dragon type recovered 718 Clarence Henry Haring, Trade and Navigation
from the shipwreck San Pedro (1595) (Fig. 3.1.2.3). Between Spain and the Indies in the Time of the
Hapsburgs, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1918, p.
116. Mentioned in Shulsky, 2001, p. 62.
719 Bonnie G. McEwan, ‘Domestic Adaptation at Puerto
Viceroyalty of Peru [3.3.1.2] Real, Haiti’, Historical Archaeology, Vol. 20, No. 1
Direct trade between Manila and the viceroyalty of Peru, as mentioned in Chapter II, (1986), p. 44; and William H. Hodges, ‘How We Found
Puerto Real’, in Kathleen Deagan (ed.), Puerto Real.
first occurred in 1582, when the second ship sent by Governor Gonzalo Ronquillo de The Archaeology of a Sixteenth-Century Spanish
Town in Hispaniola, Gainesville, 1995, p. 27.
Peñalosa arrived safely in El Callao carrying silk, porcelains, spices, iron, wax and other 720 Bonnie G. McEwan, ‘Spanish Precedents and
wares, despite the prohibition of traffic between Peru and the Philippines imposed Domestic Life at Puerto Real: The Archaeology
of Two Spanish Homesites’, in Deagan, 1995,
in 1579. A register of the goods carried by the ship sent by Governor Ronquillo, pp. 200–204 and 208–211, fig. 8.7 and table 8.1.
722
721 For more information and images of the porcelain
the Nuestra Señora de la Cinta, taken a year earlier, lists a large quantity of pottery recovered, see Lourdes Domínguez, ‘Cerámica
pieces of various types, including thick pottery. From a letter sent by the Viceroy transcultural en el sitio colonial Casa de la
723
Obrapía’ and ‘Presencia de porcelana oriental en
of Peru to the King in 1582 we learn that the ship was definitely carrying porcelain, algunos sitios coloniales de la Habana’, in Cuba
Arqueológica, No. 2, november 1980, pp. 15-26 and
as it states that ‘a quantity of things from China which are porcelains and silks and 27-37, respectively.
spices and iron and wax and blankets and silk … and other knick-knacks which are 722 Spate, 2004, p. 218; and Borah, 1954, p. 117.
According to Iwasaki Cauti, the first ships were
those commonly brought and all sold well, except for the cinnamon that does not sell sent from the Philippines to Callao in July 1580, but
they returned to the Philippines after three months.
because it is not good. And what it was said to be of the Real Hazienda were about Fernando Iwasaki Cauti, Extremo Oriente y Perú en
el Siglo XVI, Lima, 2005, p. 34.
four hundred quintals of iron and one hundred and ninety quintals of spices in which 723 AGI, Patronato 24, R 55. 1581. Krahe, 2014, Vol. II,
were cinnamon, pepper and clove’. The porcelain carried as private consignments Appendix 3, Document 2, pp. 251–253.
724
724 The original text in Spanish reads: ‘ … ha ymbiado
(together with spices) aboard the ship, captained by D. Gonzalo Ronquillo de un navío con cantidad de cosas de China que son
Ballesteros, include pieces described as ‘1 box of gilded pottery cups’, ‘12 boxes of porçcelanas y sedas y especería y hierro y sera y
mantas y seda en maço y otras buxerías que son
gilded pottery’, ‘17 cups of gilded pottery’, ‘12 boxes of gilded pottery’, ‘4 boxes of las que suelen traer y todo se ha vendido bien, sino
ha sido la canela que tiene mala salida por no ser
gilded pottery’ and ‘3 jars of gilded pottery’, which most probably were porcelain Buena. Y lo que señalaba ser de la Real Hazienda
725
with overglaze gilded decoration, as suggested by the 22,300 pieces of fine gilt china eran como quatrocientos quintales de hierro y
ciento y nouenta quintales de especería en que
imported into Acapulco in 1573. Further information regarding the porcelain carried entraua canela, pimiento y clavo. AGI, Lima 30 (Lima,
6, VIII. 1582). Cited in Iwasaki Cauti, 2005, p. 37.
on board the ship is found in documents related to the interrogation of the sea pilot 725 The original text in Spanish reads: ‘1 caja de cubiles
Antonio de Bilbao that took place on 7 January of 1583, during which he described de loza dorada’, ’12 cajas de loza dorada’, ’17 cubiles
de loza dorada’, ‘12 cajones de loza dorada’, ‘4 cajas
the contents of the cargo as ‘that ship [was carring] iron and pieces of bronze, damasks de loza dorada’, ‘3 tinas de loza dorada’, and ‘1 caja
de loza dorada’. Krahe, 2014, Vol. II, Appendix 3,
and other things of wax and silk, and pottery blue and gilt, and clover and pepper and Document 2, pp. 252–253.
244 Silk, Porcelain and Lacquer
canela’. This suggests that the cargo consisted in both blue-and-white and gilded
726
porcelain. Perhaps some pieces of porcelain were decorated with underglaze cobalt
blue as well as overglaze gold.
In Peru, as in New Spain, porcelain and other Asian goods imported from Manila
were far more abundant and cheaper than those imported from Spain. The low sale
727
price of porcelain is clearly seen in a register of the sale made by Pedro de Valladolid
to the vecino Mercado de Peñalosa in 1582–1583, which lists ‘130 dozen-and-a-half
gilded pottery at 3 ¾ reales a piece’ and ’60 dozens and ten pieces of white pottery
at 2 reales a piece’. This was a very profitable business transaction, as noted by
728
Cauti, because the porcelain and other Asian goods would not only be traded in
Lima, but also in Quito, Panama, Potosí and Chile. The merchants who imported
729
the porcelain into Peru had already made a considerable profit, as indicated by the
approximated prices of porcelain imported in the year 1581: 1 piece of gilded pottery
(porcelain) was 1 real and 10 maravedí in Macao and in Lima 6 reales; the price of blue
pottery (porcelain) was 1 real ½ in Macao and 3 reales in Lima; and the price of white
pottery (porcelain) was 7 maravedí in Macao and 3 reales in Lima. Thus residents
730
of Lima who did not belong to the highest elite could acquire porcelain and other
Asian goods if they could afford them. For instance, a modest tailor paid the sum of
1.125 pesos for blue and gilded pottery, 150 fans at 1 real and a half each’, and other
goods. According to Cauti at least two shops sold goods from China legally in Lima
731
at the time, and hucksters were also involved in the profitable trade of such goods.
732
The same year that Governor Ronquillo sent the Nuestra Señora de la Cinta
to Peru, in 1581, a royal order forbade direct trade between Lima and Manila.
Thus porcelain and other Asian goods had to be acquired by way of Acapulco. As
mentioned in Chapter II, despite the ban on trade between Peru and Acapulco and
the purchase of merchandise from the Manila Galleons imposed in 1587 and again in
1595, a flourishing illicit trade prospered. The porcelain shards excavated at various
archaeological sites in present-day Peru, Panama, Ecuador, Argentina and Chile, attest
to the illicit trade in porcelain brought by the Manila Galleons between the colonial
viceroyalties. When considering the archaeological finds discussed in the following
pages it is important to bear in mind that most of these countries have suffered
numerous earthquakes since the colonial period, which have undoubtedly affected the
726 The original text in Spanish reads: ‘… dijo que
lleuaba el dicho nauío yerro y pieças de bronce, condition of the pieces of porcelain imported into each of them. The same applies
733
damasquillos y otras cosas de cera y seda, y loça to finds made in the countries that once formed part of the viceroyalty of New Spain
azul y dorada, y clauo y pimienta y canela’. AGI,
Patronato 263, no. 1, r. 2. Cited in Iwasaki Cauti, discussed earlier.
2005, p. 39, note 56.
727 George Kuwayama, ‘Chinese Porcelain in the In Peru, urban sites have yielded blue-and-white porcelain and pieces decorated
Viceroyalty of Peru’, in Pierce and Otsuka, 2009, with overglaze enamels though most shards are blue-and-white. In Lima, the viceregal
p. 165.
I
728 wasaki Cauti, 2005, p. 45; and Krahe, 2014, Vol. I, capital, the archaeological excavations undertaken by the Catholic University of
p. 55.
729 AGI, Patronato 263, no. 1, r. 2. Iwasaki Cauti, 2005, Peru at the site Huaca Tres Palos in the Valle del Rimac yielded only fragments of a
p. 46.
730 AGI, Patronato 46, r. 31; AGI, Patronato 263, no. 1, r. blue-and-white bowl with a central lotus roundel within a crosshatch diaper border
2; and AGI, Patronato 263, no. 2, r. 3. Iwasaki Cauti, probably dating to the Longqing/Wanli reign (partially reconstructed), now housed
2005, Appendix, p. 61.
731 AGI, Patronato 263, no. 1, r. 2. Iwasaki Cauti, 2005, at the Instituto Riva-Agüero. Archaeological excavations from a context dating
734
p. 46.
732 bid., pp. 46–47. to the mid-seventeenth century in front of the Palacio de Justicia (Palace of Justice)
I
733 Kuwayama, 2009, p. 169. yielded a few shards of a Kraak porcelain plate with panelled borders of relatively
734 Published in Ibid., p. 169, fig. 7.
735 I am greatly indebted to Juan Mogrovejo for low quality and a cup of the type known as ‘crow cup’, and a blue-and–white bowl
providing me with images of the porcelain and of ordinary trade porcelain. The finds also included a shard that formed part of a
majolica decorated with Kraak style panels made
by local potters (both Spanish and mestizo) in Lima Zhangzhou dish and another of a bowl, both decorated with overglaze enamels
majolica workshops, which were found together at
the site. (Figs. 3.3.1.2.1a and b).
735
Trade in Chinese Porcelain 245