The Place of the Pottery and Porcelain Industry in East Asian History

The Place of the Pottery and Porcelain Industry in East Asian History Sung Jae Koh I. Introduction In the East Asian countries of China, Korea, and Japan, the people have been well acquainted with the use and the art of manufacture of pottery and porcelain from time immemorial. Among the crafts of these Asian countries, pottery and porcelain occupy the foremost rank as important relics of past history and civilization. Since its origin, the pottery and porcelain industry in Asia has passed through several stages of evolution. In each case the develoment of the new stage phased out the old. Although the perfection of ceramic art was achieved by the Chinese potters in the early seventh century, the fundamental aspects of the Chinese pottery and porcelain industry have remained almost static. Korea also had a prominent place in the development of ceramic art in the Far East. However, since the seventeenth century, it too has been characterized by a continuing stagnation. Only in Japan has the manufacture of pottery and porcelain been helped by the employment of Western machinery since the opening of her doors to Western nations. The purpose of this paper is to provide a comparative study on the socioeconomic factors influencing the degree of differences in the development attained by the above three countries' pottery and porcelain industry. Analysis of the problem calls for a closer consideration of the following three points: first, what are the historical backgrounds which fossilized the pottery and porcelain industry in China and Korea into stagnation or near-stagnation in the period before the impact of Western technique; second, what are the social environments that have influenced the pace and direction of the Japanese pottery and porcelain industry which differ from those of the Chinese and Korean cases; third, what are the distinguishing characteristics of the Japanese pottery and procelain industry which heightened the tendency towards small scale enterprise in its industrial struc- 144\Koh ture. In addition, we shall supplement our analysis by looking into the nature and elasticity of the contemporary political, social and economic institutions which have determined the place of the pottery and porcelain industry in each of the three countries' industrialization process. II. Historical Background of the Pottery Industry in Asia Though the history of ceramic art in China really begins from the Han dynasty (B.C. 202 to A.D. 220), the Chinese pottery known in Europe dates no further back than to the days of the Ming dynasty (1368 to 1644). The Chinese under the early Ming emperors were great builders and the face of China as it is seen today is, to a large extent, their creation . In pottery the early Ming was in some ways comparable to the contemporary Renaissance in Europe with its energy, its love of color and movement, and its care for the works of classical antiquity.1 The founder of the Ming dynasty established his capital at Nanking. The pottery manufacturing center of Ching-teh chen is not a great distance from Nanking, with which it was in communication by water, and it was natural that the court of Nanking should look to it for supplies. Ching-teh chen is situated in the district of Fou-liang, and stands on the left bank of the Ch'ang River which carries its goods to Poyang Lake, and thence to the Yangtze. The surrounding district is well supplied with the materials required for porcelain manufacture, chief of which are china-clay (kaolin) and china-stone. It is evident that the wares supplied were regarded with favor, for the rise of Ching-teh chen dates from this time and it rapidly became the center of China's pottery and porcelain industry. Even after the court of the Ming dynasty was moved to Peking in 1421, the manufacture appears to have been more and more restricted to Ching-teh chen. According to Kiangsi tung chih, or the Annals of Kiangsi province, in the second year of Hung-wu (1369), the Yu chi ch'ang, or "Imperial Porcelain Manufactory" was established at Ching-teh chen by the order of Emperor T'ai-tsu (1368-1398) with twenty imperial porcelain kilns. It is reported that...