WARES OF "SUNG" DYNASTY
vessel, which allows spots of red paste to become visible."
It is convenient to speak here of another ware of the Sung period, resembling, in its general features, both the Kuan-yao and the Ju-yao. This is the Jung-yao. Like the Kuan-yao, it was manufactured originally at Kai-fêng-fu, in Honan, and subsequently at Hang-chou in Chêkiang. It derived its name from the fact that Kai-fêng-fu was the eastern capital (Jung = east) of the Sung. The clay used for its manufacture was fine in texture, but dark. The glaze was green, of various shades, without crackle. The brown rim and iron-coloured base, so common in old céladons, appeared in most of the Jung-yao pieces. This ware differed from the Kuan-yao and Ju-yao, being coarser and heavier; features that constituted decided inferiorities. One specimen of Sung Jung-yao is figured in the Illustrated Catalogue of H'siang. It has bright green glaze, compared to jade, with floral decoration in relief. Owing to its thickness and solidity, examples of the Jung-yao descended to later centuries, and its colour was taken as a model by the céladon manufacturers of Ching-tê-chên in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Hang-chou, the Quinsai of Marco Polo, was one of the principal channels of traffic between China and the outer world during the Sung era. There can be little doubt that numerous specimens of early céladon found their way from it to countries west of the Middle Kingdom. Pieces of the Jung-yao produced at Hang-chou, were probably among the number.
One of the most important wares of the Sung dynasty was the Lung-chuan-yao, manufactured at the Liu-tien factory near Lung-chuan, in the province of
41
