Page 284 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

CHAPTER XII

CHING-TE CHEN

GHING-T^ CHfiN, the metropolis of the ceramic world, whose
venerable and glorious traditions outshine Meissen and
Sevres and all the little lights of Europe, and leave them
eclipsed and obscure, is an unwalled town or mart (chen) on the
left bank of the Ch'ang River, which flows into the Po-yang Lake,
on the northern border of the province of Kiangsi. In ancient
times it was known as Ch'ang-nan Chen, the mart on the south
of the Ch'ang, but when the Sung Emperor Chen Tsung com-
manded that officially manufactured porcelain {kuan chih tz'u)
should be sent to the capital, and that the workmen should in-
scribe the pieces with the nien hao or name of the period, which
in this case was Ching Te (1004-1007), the name of the place
was changed to Ching-te Chen.

The district town is Fou-liang, seven miles higher up the river,

a place of relatively small importance, but the residence of the

district magistrate ; and both Fou-liang and Ching-te Chen are
within the prefectural jurisdiction of Jao Chou Fu, which is situated
near the mouth of the Ch'ang.

The wares of Ching-te Chen are distributed by various routes,

some overland to Chi-men or to Wu-yuan and thence to Hang
Chou, Su Chou, Shanghai, etc. ; the rest by boat down the Ch'ang,

and thence either to Kiu-kiang on the Yangtze for further dispatch
to Chin-kiang and northwards via the Grand Canal, or to the south-

west corner of the lake and up the estuary of the Kan River to
Nan-Ch'ang Fu. From this latter town they could be carried by
water (with an interruption of thirty miles of road) all the way

to Canton. They are known under various names in Chinese

—books Chen yao, Ching-te yao, Fou-liang yao, Jao Chou yao,
—Jao yao, Ch'ang-nan yao, and Nan-ch'ang yao all of which are

easily explicable from the foregoing paragraph.

The old name of Fou-liang was Hsin-p'ing, and according to

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