Page 195 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

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Ting yao 97

In the same district, during the Yiian and Ming periods, a thin
white ware with " earthen " body was made at HsUan Chou,^

which was evidently of t'u ting type. Brinkley^ speaks of a

pottery of this kind which is greatly esteemed by the Japanese
under the name of Nyo-fu ware^ ; and a little wine cup with a

slight engraved floral decoration in the British Museum is pos-

sibly an example of this class. It has an earthy looking body,

and creamy white glaze, and is thin and very light to handle.

Under the base are engraved the words -^^ han hsing ("to con-

tain fragrance ").
In Kiang-su, the western portion of Kiang-nan, is the " white

earth village " Pai-t'u Chen,* where potteries existed from Sung

times, making a ware of the local clay, very thin, white and lus-

trous, beautiful in form and workmanship. Thirty kilns were

worked, chiefly by families of the name Tsou, under the direction

of a headman, the potters numbering several hundreds.

Under the heading of Hsi yao,^ the T'ao shuo alludes to four

factories in the province of Shansi, which are interesting to-day

in view of the various wares excavated in the railway cuttings

Anow under construction in that province. fuller description of

these potteries is given in the T'ao lu, which mentions P'ing-yang

Fu in the southern half of Shansi as a pottery centre in the T'ang

and Sung dynasties, where the ware was white but disqualified

by a glaze lacking in purity. At Ho Chou, in the same district,

a superior ware was made as early as the T'ang dynasty, which

was even considered worthy of mention in the Ko ku yao lun, pro-

bably because of the connection of P'eng Chiin-pao (see p. 94)

with this place in the Yiian dynasty. The T^ao lu tells that the

Ho ware was made of fine rich material, the body unctuous and

thin, and the colour usually white, and that it was more beautiful
— Athan P'ing-yang ware a qualified compliment !
coarse pottery

made at Yu-tzu Hsien, in the T'ai-yiian prefecture in the north,

and at P'ing-ting Chou in the west, complete the quartet. The

former dated from T'ang times, and the latter, dating from the

^W^ jT'ao '". vol. vii., fol. 10 verso.

^ F. Briiikley, Japan and China, vol. ix., p. 259.

' Nyo-fu is the Japanese name for Kiang-iian, the province of which Anhui forms

a part.

* In the district of Hsiao Hsien, department of Hsu Chou. The ware is described

gin the T'ao lu (bk. vii., fol. 7) under the name Hsiao vao.

—I