Page 225 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

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Chiin Wares and Some Others 113

gate the surface of the Chiin wares have been noticed by Chinese
writers as " hare's fur marking " and " flames of blue." ^ Others,
which appear to be irregular partings in the colour of the glaze,
have been named ch'iu ying wen or " earthworm marks." These
last rarely appear except on the finer type of Chiin wares, and,
like the "tear stains" on the Ting porcelains, they are regarded

as signs of authenticity.

Though the beautiful Chiin wares of the tz'il fai group will always
be rare and costly, Western collectors have been fortunate in secur-
ing a fair number of specimens, and a wonderful series of them
was brought together in March, 1914, in the exhibition held by the

Japan Society of New York. The forms of the flower pots vary

considerably. Some have globular body with high spreading neck
and wide mouth ; others are bell -shaped like a deep cup ; others

are deep bowls with sides shaped in six or eight lobes like the petals
of a flower ; others are of quatrefoil form ; and others of oblong
rectangular shape with straight sides expanding towards the mouth.

The saucers in which they stood are shallow bowls corresponding
in form to the pots, but supported by three or four feet which are
usually shaped like the conventional cloud scroll or ju-i head. They

are otherwise without ornament, excej^t in the case of the plain

rounded saucers, which have two bands of raised studs or bosses,
borrowed, no doubt, from a bronze vessel. These flower pots and
saucers are almost invariably incised with a numeral under the
base, and the fact that when the pots and saucers fit properly the
numerals on each are found to tally seems to indicate they are,
as suggested below, size numbers. But there is no doubt that

skin " glazes which the Japanese made at a later date. There is a good example in

the Eumorfopoulos Collection of a bowl with thick grey Chun glaze, with a patch of

reddish colour, and which is shrivelled in the most approved fashion, the glaze con-

tracting into isolated drops and exposing the body between them.

^ See T'ao shuo, bk. ii., fol. 15 verso, quoting the Liu ch'ing jih cha. In the

case of the former (fu ssu wen) some confusion has been caused by a variant reading

ijl of the word fg, {t'u = hare), which refers the simile to the " dodder " ; but the com-

moner phrase, " hare's fur marking," is far more descriptive of a dappled surface.

Brinkley's explanation of the second phrase, Iiuo yen ch'ing, as referring to the blue

centre of a tongue of flame, applying the simile to the passages of blue which sometimes

occur in the variegated Chiin glazes, seems to meet the case. The flame-like effects

are mentioned in an interesting passage in the T'ang chien kung t'ao ych t'u shuo (quoted

in the T'ao lu, bk. viii., fol. 13) : " Men prize the Chiin cups, tripods, and incense

burners with smoke and flame glaze (yen huan se). Although only pottery, still tliey

combine the unexpected colours produced by the blowing tube (I'o yo)." The i'o yo

# ^ seems to have been " a pipe for blowing up the furnace."

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