CHAPTER XV

YI-HSING [Chinese] WARE

THE potteries at Yi-hsing Hsien, in the prefecture of Ch´ang-chou, in Kiangsu, at no great distance from Shanghai, have long been celebrated for elegantly shaped teapots of unglazed stoneware in red and other colours. They have, in fact, been honoured with a special book, the _Yang-hsien ming hu hsi_,[396] or "Story of the teapots of Yang-hsien" (an old name for Yi-hsing), written in the seventeenth century[397]; but though extracts from this work occur in the _T´ao lu_ and elsewhere, I have been unable to get access to any copy of the original. This deficiency, however, has been made good by an important translation given by Brinkley[398] of a short Japanese work which, he says, "owes nothing to Japanese research, being merely transcribed from Chinese annals." The legendary story of the discovery of the all-important clay deposits in Mount Tao-jung Shu-shan is followed by a description of the chief varieties of this material which include light yellow clay for mixing; another, yellow clay called _shih huang_ (stone yellow) which turned to cinnabar red in the firing; a blue clay which turned to dark brown; a clay which produced a "pear skin" colour; a light scarlet clay which produced a pottery of the colour of pine spikelets; a light yellow clay making a green ware; and another producing a light red pottery. The "pear skin" clay mixed with white sand formed a material of a light ink brown colour.

With these materials, and with their conspicuous skill in blending clays, it may well be imagined that the Yi-hsing potters were able to make innumerable varieties in their ware. The commonest shades, however, are deep and light red, chocolate brown, buff, drab and black brown; occasionally the clays are speckled--e.g. buff ware with blue specks--or powdered with minute particles of quartz, and frequently two or more clays are used in contrasting tints on the same piece. The body of the ware is sometimes soft enough to powder under the knife, but as a rule it is a very hard stoneware, capable of receiving a fine polish on the lapidary's wheel. The choicest teapots are unglazed, though often a sort of natural gloss has formed on the surface in the kiln.

But to continue the history of the factories as outlined in Brinkley's translation, we are told that the first maker of "choice utensils of pottery for tea-drinking purposes" was a priest of the Chin-sha temple about thirteen miles south-east of Yi-hsing, and that the first really great Yi-hsing potter was Kung Ch´un [Chinese] who flourished in the Chêng Tê period (1506-1521). Though it would appear that Kung Ch´un, while attending his master Wu I-shan at the Chin-sha temple, surreptitiously learnt the secrets of the priest, his fame completely eclipsed that of his teacher, and he is usually venerated as the founder of the Yi-hsing potteries. His pots are described as being "hand made, and in most of them thumb-marks are faintly visible. Generally their colour is that of a chestnut, and they have a subdued lustre like oxidised gold. Their simplicity and accuracy of shape are inimitable; worthy to be ascribed to divine revelations."

Supernatural qualities form the only point in common between this description and that of the two teapots figured in Hsiang's Album,[399] and confidently assigned to Kung Ch´un. One of these is a drab ware and of hexagonal shape, which appears to have been formed in a mould; the other is in the form of a wine ewer and of vermilion red; and both are stated to have the wonderful quality of changing colour when filled with tea. In fact, in the second illustration the artist has depicted this phenomenon, the pot being vermilion red above and green below the tea-line. The price of these two pots in the sixteenth century was no less than 500 taels or ounces of silver.[400] Brinkley's translation gives a considerable list of Yi-hsing potters who made a reputation in the Ming dynasty, but as the characters are not added it does not always help us to identify the names,[401] among the potter's marks, and in most cases the characteristics assigned to them are entirely vague. We learn, for instance, that one man's "forte was beauty of decoration," and that three others were "renowned for the excellence of their pottery." On the other hand, it is important to read that Tung Han in the Wan Li period (1573-1619) was "the first potter who ornamented the surface of the Yi-hsing ware with elaborate designs in relief," and that many of the pieces designed by Ch´ên Chung-mei,[402] who had formerly been a porcelain maker, "such as perfume boxes, flower vases, paper weights, and so forth, show singularly fine moulding and chiselling. His vases were shaped in the form of flowers, leaves, and fruits, and were decorated with insects. His dragons sporting among storm-clouds, with outstretched claws and straining eyes; his statuettes of the goddess Kuanyin, her features at once majestic and benevolent--these are indeed wonderful productions, instinct with life." This passage shows, at any rate, that in the Ming period the Yi-hsing potters did not confine their attention to tea wares. Perhaps the most celebrated Yi-hsing potter was Shih Ta-pin, who followed in the footsteps of the great Kung Ch´un, and eventually surpassed him.

Brinkley's translation gives us very precise views of what the true form of the teapot should be. It should be small, so that the bouquet of the tea be not dispersed, and every guest should have a pot to himself. It should be shallow, with a cover which is convex inside; and it is very important that the spout should be straight. Crooked spouts were very liable to become obstructed by the tea leaves. "One drinks tea for pleasure, and one may justly feel irritated if the beverage declines to come out of the pot." The true form of teapot, we are told, began with Kung Ch´un, from which one infers that the tea bowls of the T´ang and Sung usage were in vogue up to his time. But the correct shape once established, the Yi-hsing potters soon began to take liberties with it, and to twist it into all manner of fanciful forms, such as fruits (persimmon, pomegranate, finger citron), the leaf or the seed-pod of the lotus, creature forms such as fish leaping from waves, a phœnix, and innumerable other quaint shapes, always skilfully modelled and often of high artistic merit.

[Illustration:

Fig. 1 Fig. 2

Fig. 3 Fig. 4

Fig. 5 Fig. 6

Plate 50.--Yi-hsing Stoneware, sometimes called _Buccaro_.

Figs. 1-4.--Teapots in the Dresden Collection, late seventeenth century. (1) Buff with dark patches. Height 5 inches. (2) Red ware with pierced outer casing. Diameter 5½ inches. (3) Black with gilt vine sprays. Height 4½ inches. (4) Red ware moulded with lion design. Height 4¾ inches. Fig. 5.--Peach-shaped water vessel, red ware. Diameter 4⅛ inches. _Dresden Collection._ Fig 6.--Red teapot, moulded design of trees, etc. Inscription containing the name of Ch´ien Lung. Diameter 4½ inches. _Hippisley Collection._]

The ware, as already stated, is chiefly red, dark and light, chocolate brown, buff, and drab, and it is usually without glaze. The decoration consists of: (1) Engraved designs, cut in the ware while it was still soft. These are usually inscriptions of a poetic nature, great importance being attached to the calligraphy. Indeed, we are told that "some of the potters of Yi-hsing owed their reputation chiefly to their skill in carving inscriptions. Such a man was Chan-chien, whose style of writing has been much imitated by modern artists. Another was Ta-hsin, who was employed by Shih Ta-pin to write inscriptions, and who was such a master of penmanship that his inscriptions have been carefully transcribed and are used by connoisseurs as a standard of excellence." (2) Low reliefs, either formed in the teapot mould or separately stamped out and stuck on. Occasionally gilding is found on these, but it is probably a European addition. (3) Stamped diapers of key fret, and other familiar patterns, usually forming the background for relief ornament or borders. (4) Openwork designs applied in panels over an inner lining which was usually washed with a light-tinted clay. The pierced work is commonly of floral design, often the prunus, bamboo and pine pattern, and on dishes and saucers it has no backing but is left _à jour_. All these methods of ornament are found on the examples which reached Europe at the end of the seventeenth century, and they supplied designs for the European potters of that period. (5) A later type of ornament consists of opaque coloured enamels in painted designs or as ground-colours completely hiding the surface of the ware. The colours are always of the _famille rose_ variety, including opaque pink,[403] and I do not know of any example which suggests an earlier date than Ch´ien Lung (1736-1795). Most, indeed, appear to be nineteenth century.

In addition to these, certain less familiar styles of ornament are found on the smaller objects, such as the heads of opium pipes, which are beautifully made and tastefully decorated. The red ware is sometimes coated with a transparent glaze of yellowish tint, giving a surface of warm reddish brown, exactly similar to the eighteenth century Astbury ware of Staffordshire; or, again, it is polished on the lapidary's wheel like the Böttger ware of Dresden. Inlaid designs in fine white clay and marbling are further varieties; and occasionally coloured glazes of great beauty occur. But these will be discussed presently.

There is no limit to the variety of articles made by the Yi-hsing potters, but they chiefly excelled in small and dainty articles for the writing-table, the toilet, and the tea-table, and personal ornaments. Their tea wares have always been highly prized in Japan, where they have been cleverly copied in Banko ware and by the Kioto potters. Similarly, when tea-drinking became an institution in Europe in the last half of the seventeenth century, and the East India companies set themselves to supply the necessary apparatus from China, the Yi-hsing red teapots became fashionable, and were immediately imitated by enterprising potters. The Dutch and English seem to have been the first to succeed in this new departure, and we read that Ary de Milde and W. van Eenhorn, of Delft, applied for a monopoly of the manufacture in Holland in 1679, while John Dwight, of Fulham, included the "Opacous, redd and Dark coloured Porcellane or China" in the patent taken out in London five years later. The brothers Elers, of Dutch extraction, started the industry in Staffordshire about 1693, and made red stoneware teapots scarcely distinguishable from the Chinese, and which sold for a guinea a piece.

The Yi-hsing wares in the celebrated Chinese ceramic collection formed by Augustus the Strong at Dresden supplied designs for the fine red stoneware made in the first years of the eighteenth century by Böttger, who also discovered the secret of true porcelain in Europe and founded the famous Meissen porcelain factory.

From the earliest days of their importation the Yi-hsing wares have been known in Europe, especially in Italy, Spain, and Portugal, by the Portuguese name of _buccaro_. The true _buccaro_ is a scented pottery, first imported from Central and South America, where it was made by the Indian population and afterwards manufactured in Portugal and Spain; and Count Lorenzo Magalotti, who wrote in 1695, protested against the application of the name "to certain unglazed pieces of Oriental origin," asserting that "true Buccaro never came from China or Japan, and that they must not be looked for out of the pottery sent over from Central America or the Portuguese imitations."[404] But the protests of purists were unavailing, and _buccaro_ seems to have become a regular term for unglazed pottery, even the archaic black ware from the Etruscan tombs receiving the name of _buchero nero_.

[Illustration: PLATE 51

Two Vases with glaze imitating that of the Chün Chou wares: in the Eumorfopoulos Collection.

Fig. 1.--Vase of Fat-shan (Kuangtung) Chün ware. Late Ming. Height 9¾ inches.

Fig. 2.--Bottle-shaped Vase, the base suggesting a lotus flower and the mouth a lotus seed-pod, with a ring of movable seeds on the rim. Thick and almost crystalline glaze of lavender blue colour with a patch of crimson. Yi-hsing Chün ware of the seventeenth century. Height 9¾ inches.

Fig. 1

Fig. 2 ]

Another important group of Yi-hsing wares presents an entirely different aspect, and indeed it is little understood in Europe, though it is probably bought by unwary collectors for the Sung types which it purports to imitate. This is the Yi-hsing Chün, to which allusion has already been made in discussing the imitation Chün wares. The traditions of this manufacture go back to the Ming dynasty, when a potter named Ou [Chinese] gained a great reputation for his glazes, which "copied the Ko ware in crackle and the Kuan and Chün wares in colour."[405] This is, no doubt, the manufacture mentioned in the _Po wu yao lan_ in the passage dealing with Chün yao: "At the present time (i.e. 1621-1627), among the recent manufactures this kind of ware is all made with the sandy clay (_sha t´u_) of Yi-hsing as body; the glaze is rather like the original, and in some cases beautiful, but it does not wear well."

Though the original glazed wares of Ou are probably rarer to-day than their Chün Chou prototypes, there is no reason to suppose that Ou´s successors have not kept up the continuity of the manufacture. It is certainly very much alive to-day, and an early eighteenth century reference to "the applied glaze of Yi-hsing"[406] seems to imply its existence at that time. I have before me as I write a tripod incense burner of archaic form, the body a light buff stoneware and the glaze a deep lavender, breaking into blue. It is a thick and rather opaque glaze, sufficiently flowing to have left the upper edges almost bare and formed thickly on the flatter and lower levels; the colour is broken by streaks and clouding, which mark the downward flow of the glaze; the surface has a barely perceptible crackle, which will no doubt become more marked with age, and a subdued lustre between the brilliancy of the old opalescent Chün types and the viscous, silken sheen of the Canton glazes[407] which also imitate them. The colour and glaze are distinctly attractive, and have much in common with the old Chün glazes, and though this is a frankly modern piece, it shows the potentialities of the ware. Similar specimens made, say, a hundred or two hundred years ago, and proportionately aged by time and usage, might well cause trouble to the collector.

There are, besides, quantities of common glazed pottery made at Yi-hsing in the present day, and probably for a considerable time back, which has no mission to imitate the antique. Many of the modern ginger pots are said to come from this locality, and their glazes--some with clear colours (yellow, green, or purple), others opaque and clouded, often covering moulded ornament in low relief--may help us to identify kindred types of glaze on pieces which are more ornamental and perhaps much older. But pottery, as distinct from porcelain and the finer stonewares, has never commanded much interest in China, and it has never been systematically collected and studied. The result is that it is extremely difficult to place the various types which appear from time to time except in large and ill-defined groups. A series of typical pieces of modern Yi-hsing pottery, for instance, would no doubt be of the greatest value in identifying the rather older wares made in the same place under similar traditions, but no one in Europe[408] has thought it worth their while to form one.

I have noticed that a certain type of glazed pottery is distinguished by a concave base which serves instead of the usual hollowed-out foot and foot rim, and by a glaze which stops a little short of the base in an even, regular line which is quite distinct from the wavy glaze line of the Yuan and earlier wares. A jar of this type in the British Museum has a typical Yi-hsing glaze, and though this is not perhaps sufficient ground for generalising, I would suggest that this peculiar finish is an indication of Yi-hsing manufacture.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 396: [Chinese].]

[Footnote 397: By Chou Kao-ch´i. See Bushell, _O.C.A._, p. 635.]

[Footnote 398: F. Brinkley, _Japan and China_, vol. ix., pp. 355-63.]

[Footnote 399: Op. cit., figs. 45 and 46.]

[Footnote 400: A tael is about one Mexican dollar and a third, i.e. approximately thirty pence.]

[Footnote 401: Four of the most celebrated names, however, are incidentally mentioned in the _T´ao lu_ (bk. vii., fol. 11 verso), viz. (1) _Shih Ta-pin_ [Chinese]; (2) _Li Chung-fang_ [Chinese]; (3) _Hsü Yu-ch´üan_ [Chinese]; (4) _Ch´ên Chung-mei_ [Chinese]; and (5) _Ch´ên Chün-ch´ing_ [Chinese].]

[Footnote 402: The _Yang-hsien ming hu hsi_ (quoted in the _T´ao lu_, bk. viii., fol. 8 verso) states that Ch´ên Chung-mei began by making porcelain at Ching-tê Chên. "It was exceedingly clever, and of an ornamental kind, made with supernatural ingenuity. But the results of his trade were far from sufficient to establish a name, so he gave it up and came to Yang-hsien (i.e. Yi-hsing). He took a delight in blending the teapot clays, putting his heart and soul into the work, and his ware was considered superhuman."]

[Footnote 403: I have seen specimens of Yi-hsing red ware coated with a dappled bird's egg glaze of blue green ground flecked with crimson, a type which was thought to represent the "Chün glaze of the muffle kiln." See vol. ii., p. 217.]

[Footnote 404: For this and other information on the subject, see M.L. Solon's paper on "The Noble Buccaros" in the North Staffordshire Literary and Philosophic Society's _Proceedings_, October 23rd, 1896.]

[Footnote 405: See _T´ao lu_, bk. vii., fol. 11 verso: "(Ou ware) was made in the Ming dynasty by a man of Yi-hsing ... who took the name of Ou, and everybody called it Ou's ware. It included wares which imitated Ko ware in crackle, Kuan and Chün wares in colour. Ou's bright coloured glazes were very numerous. The wares consist of flower dishes, stands for boxes, etc. The glazes with red and blue markings are particularly choice. At Ch´ang-nan the factory of T´ang used to imitate them." The last sentence refers to the celebrated T´ang Ying, who supervised the Imperial factory at Ching-tê Chên from 1728-1749. The statement that Tang's factory imitated them is no doubt based on the oft-quoted list given in the _Chiang hsi t´ung chih_ of wares made at the Imperial factory about 1730, which include "glazes of Ou. Imitations of the old ware of the potter named Ou, including two kinds, that with red and that with blue markings."]

[Footnote 406: In the list quoted in the last note. The words are [Chinese], _Yi hsing kua yu_. The word _kua_, which means "suspended, applied," is probably inserted because the Yi-hsing ware was usually unglazed.]

[Footnote 407: A similar effect is produced by zinc and tin on modern English wares. See note on p. 168. It has been suggested that these minerals were used on the Kuangtung stonewares, and appearances, at any rate, point to their presence in the Yi-hsing _flambé_ glazes as well.]

[Footnote 408: Dr. Laufer collected a considerable series of wares made in certain modern factories which he visited in China, and they may be seen in the Field Museum, Chicago, and in the Natural History Museum in New York.]