Artisans of Cizhouyao Kiln presented porcelain canteen to Yue Fei.
At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, there was a kiln artisan named Hulu at the Cizhouyao Kiln. He was clever and skillful. Once he made a kind of porcelain canteen, thick at both ends but thin in the center, convenient to carry. As it looked exactly like the gourd used by immortals in the legend, people called it porcelain gourd, also known as the canteen of the Yue’s troops. The legend goes that for recovering the occupied territory in the north, Marshal Yue Fei fought with his army from the Yangtze River all the way to the Mt. Taihang. The kiln artisans of the Cizhouyao Kiln were very excited and tried to present the Yue’s troops with a kind of porcelain canteen in kidney shape for them to carry conveniently on the march. The kiln artisan Hulu thought he should send Marshal Yue and his troops a precious canteen just like that used by Taishang Laojun (the Very High Lord in the legend) to hold elixir vitae as Marshal Yuehad rendered outstanding service to the Song Dynasty.
It was said that the water used to blend the clay for making the treasured canteen of he Very High Lord was taken from nine rivers and eighteen lakes. So he sent someone to take the spring water from nine springs, such as the Black Dragon Spring, the Yellow Dragon Spring, the Dark-green Dragon Spring, the Old Dragon Spring, the Jade Dragon Spring, etc. In the clay to make the canteen, he added costly medicines, such as musk, glossy ganoderma, bezoar, peppermint, etc. Finally, when the canteen was done to hold water or wine, not only could it quench thirst and relieve summer heat but also cure all diseases.
The officers and men of the Yue’s troops went on with the march with the porcelain canteen, sweeping northward from victory to victory. Afterwards due to the collusion between Qin Hui and the Jin troops, the Yue’s troops were besieged on the top of the Mt. Jiushi. Before long all the water bottled in the ordinary porcelain canteen was drunk up but the officers and men found to the surprise that the water and wine in Marshal Yuan’s porcelain canteen would never go empty. They found some big Chinese characters “Porcelain Canteen with Water from Nine Spring” and some small Chinese characters “Cizhouyao Kiln” inscribed at the bottom of the canteen. The officers and men drank freely with great joviality. After drinking the wine to their heart’s content, they rushed down the mountain. Afterwards, the Yue’s troops recovered a large stretch of territory.
Brother Kilns- the two brothers, Zhang Shengyi and Zhang Sheng’er, worked hard to improve celadon technology
The longquan celadon is one of the notable varieties of the traditional ceramics of China. This legend was about how two brothers, Zhang Shengyi and Zhang Sheng’er, of Longquan County, Zhejiang, in the Southern Song Dynasty improved celadon. The legend has it that the Zhang family was engaged in porcelain-making from generation to generation. According to their father’s last wish, the two brothers ran their respective kiln and tried hard to make innovation.
Beginning with colors, Zhang Sheng’er analyzed seriously all the colors man could see in the sky and on the earth and came to the conclusion that cyan was the basis of all colors, the essence of all colors and the most beautiful color, as it pleased both the eye and the mind. After discussion, the two brothers decided to take cyan as the fixed color of the Zhang family to make porcelain. When he happened to see a green plum tree standing gracefully erect by the kiln shed, Zhang Sheng’er thought the cyan of plums, he had them simmered into thick juice, blended it into glaze and applied it onto the porcelain base. Finally celadon, which was bluish, came into being and caused a great sensation. After seeing it, Emperor Gaozong (1127-1131) of the Southern Song Dynasty was so delighted with it that he could hardly bear to put it down on seeing it and issued the imperial decree to change the porcelain kiln of Zhang Sheng’er into a government-run porcelain industry and conferred the title of the “Diyao Kiln” (The Younger Brother’s Kiln) upon it.
Zhang Shengyi also cherished high ambitions in his life, trying to burn out a kind of crackle porcelain, which had always been believed to be something bestowed by deities, as an artifact. In order to be disclose the secret of porcelain crackling, he kept to himself and never got married. After serious studies and investigations, he found that for gaining a few pieces of crackle porcelain the people of his time often threw a living person into the blazing kiln. The blood and moisture of the living person caused the crackling of the porcelain. When blood congealed, the color was purple. That is why the color o crackle porcelain was always of a little blood red. Besides, when the porcelain base came across moisture, there was no time for it to shrink and hence crackling in polygonal shape. As Longquan was available with a special kind of clay with the color of a little blood red, the key issue was moisture and the right amoun of water injection. Zhang Shengyi persisted in doing contrast test but failed again and again.
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Qiu Changchun studied intensively how to perfect jade-carving technology
Qiu Chuji, also known as Taoist Changchun, was the earliest ancestor of jade trade in Beijing and was called Ancestor Qiu by artisans. As the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, Ancestor Qiu was born in a town in Shangdong and his family financial situation was poverty-stricken. Not far away from his home, there was a small jade workshop, where he acknowledged somebody as his master and learned the skills of jade carving. Due to this father’s early death of illness, Ancestor Qiu discontinued his apprenticeship. Later, during the chaos caused by war, he could live on nothing but to make a living on carrying people across the river on his back.
At the riverside he happened to meet a Taoist priest. On seeing that the young man was intelligent by natural endowments, the Taoist priest accepted him as a disciple and let him roam everywhere to study jadeware as his main job so that he could learn skills and help the distressed. Afterwards, Ancestor Qiu had the opportunity to tour around China to those places rich in jade, such as Xinjiang. He learned the skills of how to look at a piece of jade and judge its worth. Besides, he also studied hard to master various kinds of workmanship for artisans.
After the Yuan Dynasty founded its capital in Beijing, Ancestor Qiu came all the way to Beijing through the northwest and settled down at the Baiyun Guan (The White Cloud Taoist Temple) to devote himself to jadeware fabrication. His nationwide touring widened his field of vision. By drawing on other people’s merits and making use of the knowledge passed on to him by the Taoist priest, every piece of jadeware he fabricated was exquisite. Not only was Ancestor Qiu proficient in jadeware himself, he also passed on his jade carving skills to others in accordance with their aptitude. With his advocate and support, the jadeware trade came into being in Beijing and the Baiyun Guan became an institute for Ancestor Qiu to pass on his skills.
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