Page 124 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

CHAPTER V

JU, KUAN, AND KO WARES

Ju yao '2^^

THOUGH no authenticated example of Ju ware is known in
Europe, it is impossible to ignore a factory whose produc-
tions were unanimously acclaimed by Chinese writers as the
cream of the Sung wares. Its place of origin, Ju Chou, in the

province of Honan, lies in the very district which was celebrated

in a previous reign for the Ch'ai pottery, and it is probable that

the Ju factories continued the traditions of this mysterious ware.
Nothing, however, is known of them until they received the Impe-

rial command to supply a cliing (blue or green) porcelain to take

the place of the M^hite Ting Chou porcelain which had fallen into

temporary disfavour on account of certain blemishes. This event,

M^hich took place towards the end of the Northern Sung period (960-

1127 A.D.), implies that whatever had been their past history, the

Ju Chou factories were at this period pre-eminent for the beauty

of their cJiing porcelain. It would appear from the Cliing po tsa
chih,^ which was written in 1193, that the Ju Chou potters were
set to work in the " forbidden precincts of the Palace," and that

selected pieces only were offered for Imperial use, the rejected

specimens being offered for sale. Even at the end of the twelfth

century we are assured that it was very difficult to obtain examples

of the ware.

From the various accounts on which we have to depend for

our conception of the ware, it is clear that the body was of a dark

colour.^ The glaze was thick and of a colour variously described

as " approaching the blue of the sky after rain " (i.e. like the Ch'ai

We^ Quoted in the T'ao la, bk. ix., fol. 9 verso. gather from this passage that Ju

Chou potters were summoned to the Imperial precincts at K'ai-feng Fu ; for Ju Chou

itself is some distance from the capital.

— —2 The Liu cKing jih cba a Ming worlc quoted in the Tao shiio describes it as

" in colour like Ko ware, but with a faint yellowish tinge " ; and the more modern

T'ao lu (bk. vi., fol. 2) speaks of it as having " clay fine and lustrous like copper."

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