Page 158 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

CHAPTER VI

lung-ch'uan yao f|j^|§

IN discussing the celebrated Lung-ch'iian celadons, we are able
to build our structure on a more solid basis. For one group
of them, at any rate, is so familiar that we should be tempted
to abandon the difficult Chinese descriptions and construct an
essay on the ware from actually existing specimens, were it not
that in so doing we should miss our chief opportunity of applying
a living test to the Chinese phrases.

The district of Lung-ch'iian in the prefecture of Ch'u-chou,
province of Chekiang, was noted for its potteries as early ^ as the
beginning of the Sung dynasty, but its greatest celebrity was
attained by the market town of Liu-t'ien, where the Chang brothers
are reputed to have worked.- The story that the elder Chang
moved to Liu-t'ien while the younger brother remained at Lung-

ch'iian is, I believe, based on a misreading of a Chinese passage,^
the true meaning of which seems to be that while the elder brother

made new departures which earned for his ware the distinctive

name of Ko yao, the younger continued the Lung-ch'iian tradi-

tions, and consequently his ware was known as Lung-ch'iian yao.
It appears that one vital difference between the two wares was
crackle, which was used by the elder and not by the younger

brother.

The productions of the Lung-ch'iian district are variously named

in the Ko ku yao lun, " Ch'u ware " (from Ch'u-chou Fu, the
name of the prefecture), " ch'ing ware," and " old ch'mg ware,"

A^ See r'ao lu, bk. vi., fol. 4. factory of inferior reputation is supposed to have

existed at the neighbouring village of Chin-ts'un (see Hirth, Ancient Chinese Porcelain,

p. 38). And the Tao lu (bk. vii., fol. 6) describes a factory at Li-shui Hsien in the

Ch'u-chou district, whose productions were also known as Ch'u ware.

Tu« In the shu, bk. ccxlviii., section Tz'u ch'i pu hui k'ao, fol. 13, we are told that

the brothers Chang worked beneath the Han liu hill at Lung-ch'uan in the Sung and

Yuan dynasties.

* r'ao shuo, bk. ii., fol. 12 recto.

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