Porcelain

86

When compared with a similar collection of European wares, perhaps the most noticeable difference is the small number of vessels adapted to pouring. So much is this the case that when we find a spout or lip on a specimen of Chinese porcelain, the piece takes at once a somewhat exotic aspect, and we are reminded of the Arab Ibraik, or the European ewer.

87

It is a curious fact that London chemists now send out their pills in little glass bottles almost identical in shape and size with these Chinese yao-ping.

88

The word is used in a restricted sense as explained above.

89

We have far too often to fall back on names of French origin. Our colour-vocabulary in the case of the enamels and glazes of porcelain is a sadly poor one.

90

In the case of some monochrome ware the colour may have been painted on the raw paste or on the biscuit, and a colourless glaze then added; or again, as in the case of the coral red mentioned below, it may be painted like an enamel over the glaze.

91

It must, however, be remembered that this carved lacquer itself is sometimes applied as a coating to porcelain in China.

92

It would be convenient to have a name to include the whole series—the flambé, the sang de bœuf, the lavender Yuan, and perhaps also the peach-bloom and the ‘robin’s egg.’ I would propose to include all these classes under the head of transmutation glazes.

93

A French writer compares the effect to the ‘palette d’un coloriste montrée sous un morceau de glace’ (E. de Goncourt, La Maison d’un Artiste).

94

There were many kinds of ‘furnace transmutations’ known to the Chinese, mostly of a miraculous nature (see Bushell, p. 219).

95

When applied to the whole surface, a similar slip forms the ground on which the decoration is painted in the case of many kinds of European and Saracenic fayence, but in such ware the slip is used to conceal a more or less coarse and coloured paste.

96

It may, however, be noticed, on close examination, that the crackles do not seem to be developed in the lower glaze covered by the slip. This would rather point to both the first and the second coats of glaze, as well as the intermediate slip, being all applied before the firing.

97

Not that we need claim any great age for these plates, but it is in such places that old types (as e.g. the celadon) are likely to continue in fashion.

98

We may perhaps connect the first steady export of ‘blue and white’ direct to Europe with the establishment of the Dutch at Nagasaki, where they probably employed Chinese workmen.

99

So what is by far the most successful imitation of Chinese ‘blue and white’ ever produced in Europe was made by the Dutch, in the enamelled fayence of Delft, about the middle of the century.

100

In Japanese art also we find the prunus as a symbol of the approaching spring, but there the branches are covered with freshly fallen snow. The contrast of the weather in early spring, in China and Japan respectively, could not be better expressed—by ice in the one case, by soft thawing snow in the other.

101

Dr. Zimmermann, the curator of the Dresden Museum, regards the black division of the famille verte as a product of the demi grand feu, i.e. he holds that the black and green was painted on the biscuit. But this is certainly not the case with the fully developed examples. I may say that this class is only represented at Dresden by some small roughly painted plates.

102

We find it so used, however, upon the Japanese ‘Kakiyemon’ porcelain, some of which cannot be much later than the middle of the seventeenth century.

103

Since writing this I have discovered a tall-necked bottle of this ware at South Kensington, which is stated to have been purchased in Persia (Pl. xx.).

104

That is to say, no attempt was ever made to imitate the material—the hard paste.

105

An important collection of armorial china was bequeathed to the Museum in 1887 by the Rev. Charles Walker.

106

This plate belongs to a group in which the arms, above all the mantlings, are in the style of the seventeenth century. On these the gules is always rendered by an opaque iron-red, although the new rouge d’or is freely used in the rest of the decoration. I learn from my friend Colonel Croft Lyons that the arms on this plate are those of Leake Okeover, who was born in 1701. The initials, repeated four times on the margin, L. M. O., stand for Leake and his wife Mary. The plate, therefore, cannot well have been painted before, say, 1725.

107

This class of Kuang yao must not be confused with the old heavy pieces of Yuan ware mentioned on p. 77.

108

I quote, with a few contractions, from the edition of 1774.

109

I have examined the Korean pottery in the British Museum, at Sèvres, and that in some of the German museums, but I have not seen the specimens in the Ethnographical Museum at Hamburg, which are said to be very remarkable.

110

For an account of the exploration of Sawankalok, see Man, the volume for 1901. By the kind permission of Mr. Read I have been able to closely examine the specimens which are now deposited in the British Museum.

111

We may mention that the Japanese appear also to give the name of Kochi to other wares, especially to the deep blue and turquoise porcelain with decoration in ribbed cloisons which we have attributed to early Ming times.

112

We may compare with this the impulse given, some four hundred years later, in Europe, to the spread of the use of porcelain at the time when tea was first introduced in the West.

113

See page 66. This Sung ware is known to the Japanese as ‘Temmoku,’ and is highly esteemed by them.

114

Many, however, of these so-called Jesuit plates were probably painted at King-te-chen at a later date. Christianity was finally and ruthlessly crushed in Japan after the rebellion of 1637: in China it was tolerated up to the close of the reign of Kang-he (1721). I must refer back to a quotation from the Père D’Entrecolles given on p. 133. See also a curious note in Marryat, where a statuette of Quanyin, with the boy patron of learning, is described as ‘a Virgin and Child.’—Pottery and Porcelain, p. 293.

115

In the Dresden collection are several cases full of this early Japanese blue and white.

116

The Chinese, however, were given much greater liberty than the Dutch.

117

See the South Kensington handbook on Japanese pottery, p. 86. In the chapter on Japanese ceramics contained in the magnificently illustrated History of the Arts of Japan, published in 1901 in connection with the Paris Exhibition, a little further light is thrown on the history of porcelain in that country. But in this work and in the other guides published at the time of our American and European exhibitions (and the same may be said of the Japanese report contained in the South Kensington handbook), the same scanty materials are served up again and again.

118

Ambassades Mémorables de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales des Provinces Unies vers les Empereurs du Japon, Amsterdam, 1680, Part ii. p. 102. I take the reference from Marryat, but I have not been able to find the book.

119

We know of no Chinese type to which we can refer this decoration. Certain points of resemblance have been found with the work of the great contemporary Japanese artist Tanyu. The most characteristic motifs are the tiger, the dancing boy with long sleeves, and the straw hedge.

120

The ‘old Japan’ was at one time closely copied at King-te-chen for exportation to Europe. (Cf. Pl. xxiv. 1.)

121

The composition of the Owari porcelain is more normal, the silica only amounting to 65 per cent.; but as the paste contains little or no lime, it comes nearer to the hard porcelain of Berlin than to the milder Chinese type.

122

Much, however, of the china-stone of Cornwall differs little in composition from the Imari stone; but the latter contains, as we have said, soda, in place of the more usual potash.

123

It is to this Koransha, I understand, that we are indebted for the historical notices on Japanese porcelain that have appeared on the occasion of our successive international exhibitions (see above, p. 183 note).

124

Captain Brinkley speaks of the lower edge being serrated, but I have never seen any specimen of this serration.

125

Another seal was granted to Zengoro with the inscription (reading in Chinese) Hopin chi liu (Pl. B. 24). This refers to an old tradition that Shun, a Chinese emperor of very early date, had, before his accession to the throne, made pottery at a place called Hopin, in Honan. This story is told by Ssuma Chien, the ‘Herodotus of China,’ and would be well known to scholars in Japan. These characters are sometimes found on Japanese ware. (Cf. Bushell, chap. i., and the Franks catalogue, fig. 191, where, however, the words are wrongly interpreted.) Yeiraku, I should add, may be also rendered ‘long content.’

126

This question of the relation between the Kishiu, the Kochi of the Japanese, and our class of old Ming wares with coloured glazes, is full of difficulties. It remains for some Japanese connoisseur, who is at the same time both an expert in ceramics and a good Chinese scholar, to clear it up.

127

This work is analysed by Dr. Hirth in his essay on Ancient Chinese Porcelain already referred to.

128

Dr. Meyer, who brought this collection together, has always supported the theory that in early days no true porcelain was ever made except in China. In support of this he points to the specimens, including ‘wasters,’ from Sawankalok in Siam, in this collection, as being all of stoneware. We have seen (p. 173) that more recent excavations in the same neighbourhood have brought to light fragments of true porcelain of undoubted local manufacture. It is true, however, that most of the examples of celadon in the Dresden collection are of what we should call a kaolinic stoneware.

129

I suppose that Franks, who refers to this notice, was satisfied that the present really consisted of Chinese ware. Many slips have been made in quoting this passage, but I will only point out that Nureddin, who died in 1173, has no claim to the title of caliph.

130

This belief, however, long lingered not only in the East, but even in Europe. According to some, if poison was present, the bowl lost its transparency; others state that the liquid would boil up in the centre, remaining clear round the edge. In a French comic poem, written as late as 1716, among other merits possessed by vessels of Chinese porcelain, it is claimed for them that—

‘Ils font connaître les mystèresDes bouillons à la Brinvillière.’

131

By far the greater number of the fragments are of local or at least of Saracenic origin, and many of them may be as old as the date mentioned in the text. But at Fostât, at all events, some of the pot-sherds are of a much later date. There are important collections of fragments from these rubbish-heaps both in the British Museum and at South Kensington.

132

Professor Karabacek of Vienna quotes from the encyclopædist Hâdji Khalifa, who died in 1658: ‘The precious magnificent celadon dishes seen in his time were manufactured and exported at Martabani, in Pegu.’

133

The little bowl of apple-green porcelain in the British Museum, ‘garnished’ with a mounting of the time of Henry viii., has perhaps as long a European history. The two ‘Trenchard’ bowls (in spite of the later date of the mounting) probably came to England in 1506.

134

I think that it is not unlikely that during the time that King-te-chen lay waste, kilns may have been erected somewhere in the neighbourhood of the Canton river, and that from these kilns originated much of the rough ware, hastily decorated in blue, that reached India and Persia in such quantities at this time (cf. the statement of Raynal quoted on p. 166). We have spoken in the last chapter of the influence of these events upon the Japanese trade.

135

I am referring, of course, to Stuart times. In the eighteenth century the so-called Gombroon ware was of Persian origin, and recognised as such in England.

136

The word ‘china’ is used in this sense, I think, by no other European nation.

137

See, however, for the Portuguese merchants who sold porcelain in France, the note on page 230.

138

The Abbé Raynal, writing about 1770, says that connoisseurs divide Oriental porcelain into six classes—‘truitée, vieille blanche, de Japon, de Chine, le Japon Chiné et la porcelaine des Indes.’

139

Marryat’s extracts are unfortunately often carelessly quoted; nor is it easy in all cases to control them by reference to the originals.

140

August ii. certainly bought a collection of porcelain from the Bassetouche family for 6750 thalers. It would be interesting to know of what wares this collection consisted. The only further additions until quite recent times have been to the European department.

141

The tradition of the ‘dinner-service’ made in China for Charles v., and presented by him to Moritz of Saxony (or, as others say, captured from him by that prince), belongs to the same category of stories as that of the crusader’s cup. No such commission as this was possible at so early a date, and there is nothing in the Dresden collection that could be connected with such a service.

142

‘Menez-moi chez les PortugaisNous y verrons à peu de fraisDes marchandises de la Chine. . . de la porcelaine fine,’ etc.—Scarron, Paris Burlesque.

143

In 1689 Madame de Sévigné notes the quantity of Oriental porcelain imported at L’Orient.

144

Are we to identify these with some huge Imari vases, now in the Louvre, with coats of arms bearing the French lilies and the label of Orleans? Some similar vases, with the same arms, have lately been seen in dealers’ shops in London.

145

The catalogues of Gersaint and of some other early French collections may be found at South Kensington.

146

Passeri, writing in 1752 in favour of the then neglected majolica, claims that ‘la parte brutale dell’ uomo sarà a favor delle porcellane, ma l’intellettuale e raziocinativa giudicherà a favor delle nostre majoliche.’

147

Recent researches in the archives of Venice have proved that Oriental porcelain was comparatively abundant in Venice at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Dr. Ludwig has shown me extracts from the inventory of the property of a rich ‘cittadino’ who died in 1526, in which can be distinguished plain white, blue and white, and porcelain decorated with red, green, and gold.

148

It is quite possible that Palissy may have tried his hand at this problem. M. Solon has suggested that in the many years’ labour at Saintes (when attempting especially to imitate ‘the cup with white enamel’) Palissy was really seeking to make porcelain.

149

I take the following from the excellent catalogue of the Ceramic Museum at Limoges, by E. Garnier: ‘1125. Pot à Pommade, de forme cylindrique godronné à la partie inférieure et décoré en bleu d’une bande de lambrequins. Marque A.P.’ Some other small pieces in this museum are classed as Rouen porcelain.

150

Professor Church allows that ‘the substance of some of these statuettes is distinctly porcellanous.’ He found, however, in a fragment of this ware as much as 79·5 per cent. of silica, and only 12·5 per cent. of alumina (Cantor Lectures, 1881).

151

This feeling is well expressed in a contemporary drinking-song:—

‘To drink is a Christian diversionUnfit for your Turk or your Persian;Let Mohammedan fools live by heathenish rules,And get drunk over tea-cups and coffee,But let British lads sing, give a rouse for the king,A fig for your Turk and your Sophi.’

The punch-bowl of porcelain, however, came to the rescue about this time.

152

In the porcelain gallery at Dresden may be seen (together with one or two small lumps of gold and silver, the results of Böttger’s alchemistic experiments) some snuff-boxes and little flasks of a marbled glass, made by Tschirnhaus at an early date. It is probable that the latter experimenter’s researches lay rather in the way of a frit-made soft paste, on the same lines as the contemporary attempts in France.

153

And yet, forty years later (so well was the secret kept), it was maintained by practical authorities in France that the Saxon ware was no true porcelain, but only some kind of hard enamel. See Hellot’s Mémoire, quoted below.

154

We hear, however, of Dutch potters being engaged as early as 1708, and with their assistance Böttger, in 1709, made some imitations of Delft ware.

155

In a contemporary German pamphlet, which I only know from a French translation (Secret des Vrais Porcelaines de la Chine et de Saxe, Paris, 1752), a certain ‘spath alkalin’ is mentioned as an important element in Saxon porcelain, and this substance is identified with the petuntse of the Père D’Entrecolles.

156

If this colour is derived from the purple of Cassius, as seems probable, it is an important instance of the early use of this pigment upon porcelain.

157

Above all the famous ‘Swan Service’ of 1736, Kändler’s masterpiece.

158

We had in England until lately an unrivalled collection of these little groups—priceless specimens of the best period. They were exhibited by their owner, Mr. Massey Mainwaring, for some time at Bethnal Green. This collection has, however, now found its way to America.

159

On the other hand, as early as 1732 the Meissen ware was finding its way to the East. Quantities of little coffee-cups (known as Türken Copjen, corrupted into Türken Köpfchen) were sent to Constantinople to be re-exported to other Mohammedan countries.

160

We may remind the reader that it was a syndicate of Berlin merchants who at an earlier date sought, it is said, to purchase from Böttger his secret. There is little doubt, however, that the anecdotes about Ringler, which abound in the notices on German porcelain, are little more than ‘porcelain myths.’ Very similar anecdotes are told of the early days at Vincennes, and in Japan, as we have seen, such stories sometimes take a more tragical form. There is a strong temptation, no doubt, in traversing the somewhat arid ground of German ceramics, to fall back on such tales. At all events they belong to the class of tendenz Mährchen, and illustrate the difficulties to be overcome at that time in starting a new factory.

161

Not but that we have proof of his interest in the subject, as the following letter, dated Meissen, March 28, 1761, will show. It is written to Madame Camas, his chère Maman, who was then with the queen at Magdeburg:—‘I send you, my dear mamma, a little trifle, by way of keepsake and memento. You may use the box for your rouge, for your patches, or you may put snuff in it or bonbons or pills.... I have ordered porcelain for all the world, for Schönhausen, for my sisters-in-law,—in fact I am rich in this brittle material only. And I hope the receivers will accept it as current money: for the truth is, we are poor as can be, good mamma. I have nothing left but my honour, my coat, my sword, and my porcelain.’—Carlyle’s Frederick the Great, Book xx. chap. vi. Marryat, who gives this letter in his notes, mixes up Carlyle’s comments with the text.

162

The Hohenzollern shield bears two sceptres in saltire en surtout.

163

Another account gives the credit to Von Löwenfinck, a porcelain painter from Meissen.

164

Politically, that is to say; for the town formed part of the ‘Pays d’Étrangers,’ and its commercial and social relations were still rather with Germany than with France.

165

I take these facts about the Hannong family from Sir A. Wollaston Franks’s Catalogue of Continental Porcelain, 1896.

166

In the same year we find Count Schimmelmann, who at a later date interested himself in the Copenhagen factory, selling by auction at Hamburg some of the vast stocks of Meissen china that Frederick had thrown on the market.

167

As a royal factory, however, it became extinct in 1864. See chap. xxiii.

168

Thus we have, during the Seven Years’ War, Frederick’s three bitter opponents—Maria Theresa in Austria, Elizabeth in Russia, and the Marquise de Pompadour in France—all taking an active interest in promoting the manufacture of porcelain, and this rivalry may have added to the zest of Frederick when he looted Meissen and sought to make Berlin take its place as the metropolis of porcelain.

169

An American writer has arranged the tests by which soft pastes may be distinguished from true porcelains under six heads. 1. The file test.—Soft porcelain may be marked by a file. 2. The foot test.—In hard porcelain the foot is generally rough and unglazed. This test is rather of value in distinguishing porcelain from fayence. 3. The fire test.—Depending on the greater fusibility of the soft pastes. 4. Chemical test. 5. Colour test.—Soft paste is generally mellow ivory by transmitted light, and this is especially true of ‘bone-ware.’ The hard paste tends to bluish shades. 6. Fracture test.—The fracture is glassy to vitreous, and the glaze passes into the paste in the case of hard pastes (the subconchoidal splintery fracture is rather the point to observe); dry and chalky, and the glaze more or less separated from the paste in the case of soft pastes.—E. A. Barber, Pottery and Porcelain of the United States, New York, 1901.

170

De Réaumur, we must remember, had made some kind of hard-paste porcelain from Chinese materials. After that he fell back upon his devitrified glass. Something very similar had been made by Tschirnhaus many years before.

171

These, I think, are almost the only instances in which a distinctly seventeenth century decoration is to be found on porcelain.

172

These trembleuse saucers of the early eighteenth century have a projecting ring into which the base of the teacup fits.

173

The extreme limits for this mark are 1712-62, but Chaffers says it was not used before 1730, according to another authority not before 1735. De Frasnay, in a note to his curious little poem in praise of fayence (1735), says: ‘le secret du beau rouge n’est guère connu en France que d’un très petit nombre de personnes.’ The point is of interest in connection with the origin of the famille rose in China. We may here note that the minute quantity of gold—the source of all these pink and purple colours—is not necessarily introduced in the form of the tin salt, the purple of Cassius. But this difficult question will be best treated in connection with the history of glass.