Page 241 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

Chiin Wares and Some Others 123

Another ware which has a superficial resemblance to Chiin yao

has been made for a long period at the Kuangtung factories,^ if

Ait does not actually go back to Sung times. typical specimen,

shown in Plate 51, is a vase of baluster form with wide shoulders

strengthened by a collar with foliate edge, and small neck and

mouth, ornamented with a handsome lotus scroll in relief. The

body is a buff stoneware, and the glaze is thick, opaque, and closely

crackled, and of pale lavender grey warming into purple.

Glazes of this kind have been made at several potteries in Japan

e.g. Hagi, Akahada, and Seto.^ Besides such specimens as this,

there are many of the streaky, mottled Canton stonewares which

are remotely analogous to the variegated Chiin wares. The glazes

of this type are more fluescent than those described in the pre-

ceding paragraph and have greater transparency, and the inten-

tion of their makers to imitate Chiin types is shown by incised

numerals which are occasionally added under the base. They are

known in China as Fat-shan Chiin, from the locality in which they

are made, and though some examples may go back to INIing times,

the best may, as a rule, be ascribed to the eighteenth century and

the indifferent specimens to the present day.

From this digression on Chiin imitations to which the mention

of Yi-hsing led us, we must return to the original wares. It has

been said that Chinese connoisseurs recognise two groups of Chiin

ware, the tz^u t'ai and the sha fai, and there is no doubt that the

contrast between the body material of the two is very marked.

In explanation of this the Chinese to-day allege ^ that the flower

pots and stands were made of a tribute clay sent annually from
the Ching-te Chen district to the " Imperial kilns " at Chiin Chou,

and that the coarser articles were made of native clays. The story
has the air of an ex post facto explanation, and it is open to many

grave objections. In the first place it is nowhere mentioned in

Chinese literature, and in the second place the Chiin Chou kilns,
so far from having been described as " Imperial " in the Sung

dynasty, are entirely ignored by the earlier writers, and even in

the late Ming works, where they are first mentioned, the Chiin wares

are reckoned as of secondary importance. Thirdly, there does not

seem to have been any need to import kaolin, for Chiin Chou was in

1 See p, 168.

* See Burlington Magazine, November, 1909, Plate iv., opp. p, 83.

3 See Mrs. Williams, loc. cit., p. 33.