CHAPTER VI
KERAMICS
Though the golden period of Japanese Keramic art was attained during the Tokugawa dynasty, 1603-1868, yet its origin is lost in the mists of antiquity. An interesting passage in an old Japanese chronicle shows that in the times of the Emperor Suwinin, about the beginning of the Christian era, the craft of the potter was the recognised industry of certain tribes. After giving an account of the death and burial of the Mikado’s brother the record proceeds:
“On this they assembled those who had been in his immediate service, and buried them all upright round his sepulchre alive. For many days they died not, but day and night wept and cried. At last they died and rotted. Dogs and crows assembled and ate them. The Mikado, hearing the sound of their weeping and crying, felt saddened and pained in his heart. He commanded all his high officers saying: ‘It is a very painful matter to force those whom we have loved during life to follow us in death, and though it is an ancient custom why follow it if it be bad? From now and henceforth plan so as to stop causing men to follow the dead.’ On the death of the Empress, some time afterwards, the Emperor called his advisers together, and asked them: ‘What shall be done in the case of the present burying?’ Thereupon Nomi-no-Sukune advanced, and said: ‘It is not good to bury living men standing at the sepulchre of a prince, and this cannot be handed down to posterity. I pray leave now to propose a convenient plan, and to lay this before the sovereign.’ And he sent messengers to summon up a hundred of the clay-workers’ tribe of the country of Idzumo, and he himself directed the men of the clay-workers’ tribe in taking clay and forming shapes of men, horses, and various things, and presented them to the Mikado, saying: ‘From now and henceforth let it be the law for posterity to exchange things of clay for living men, and set them up in sepulchres.’”
The result of Mr W. Gowland’s excavations of the dolmens, or burial mounds, which date from about 200 B.C. to 600 A.D., has been the discovery of a great deal of the ancient pottery—coarse ware unglazed and unpainted, and decorated only with simple patterns of lines incised in the clay while soft. The shapes, however, are often graceful and pleasing. In the dolmens were also found the rude terra-cotta figures of men above referred to.
For many centuries the art of the potter remained in very much the same primitive condition. A coarse ware sufficed for the domestic utensils of the common people, and lacquered vessels supplied the wants of the more luxurious. There is, indeed, mention of Korean potters having been brought over to Japan after the Empress Jingo’s victorious campaign, and it is said that the art of glazing was practised at Hizen in the eighth century.
Little real advance, however, was made till the thirteenth century, when Kato Shirazayemon, better known as Toshiro, a native of Seto in Owari, and the father of Japanese pottery, appears. Dissatisfied with the results of the native kilns he visited China in 1223 to study the methods practised there, and after six years’ absence returned to Seto. His pottery is a brown stoneware of firm and dense texture, and is covered with a glaze of a deep rich brown, sometimes mottled, altogether a great advance on the previous product of the country. The vessels made by him, mostly cha-ire, or tea-jars, used in the tea ceremony, are now valued at fabulous prices by the Japanese dilettante.
A certain authority states that Japanese history has been denominated by three factors: the sword, the tea-cup, and the paper house. The effects of the first and the last have been already indicated, and a few words here as to the second may not be out of place.
Legend ascribes a supernatural origin to the tea-plant. The Buddhist saint Daruma, he who sat wrapt in meditation for eight long years so that he quite lost the use of his lower limbs, once at his devotions was overpowered by sleep. On awakening, filled with shame at his frailty, he took a pair of scissors, and, snipping off the offending eyelids, cast them indignantly from him. They took root where they fell, and from them sprang a plant whose leaves had the magic quality of driving away sleep from weary eyes. In the temples it was much valued by the holy men, and a certain degree of ceremony or ritual attended its use.
It was in the time of Yoshimasa, in the fifteenth century, that the cha-no-yu, or tea ceremony, began to assume public importance. In his peaceful retirement, surrounded by artists and philosophers, it was practised by the ex-Shogun. The priest Shuko drew up a code of its rules, characterised by a severe and dignified simplicity. The room used was small, and plain to bareness, the utensils were unornamented, but, though to the ordinary eye crude and rough, were much prized by the connoisseur. Indeed, Yoshimasa often rewarded important services not by a grant of land but by the gift of a valued tea-jar.
A hundred years later Hideyoshi revived the ceremony, and its rules were revised by the famous philosopher Rikiu, the greatest of all the Cha-jin, or tea professors. Rikiu considered that the essentials of the tea ceremony were: “Purity, peacefulness, reverence, and abstraction.” “It was important for the guest to come with clean hands, but much more so with a clean heart.” Social rank was ignored: those present took rank according to their standing and reputation as Cha-jin. The most perfect courtesy and politeness governed all the proceedings. Frivolous or worldly talk was forbidden, and the conversation chiefly turned on the merit of the kakemono adorning the room, the flower decoration hanging before it, and the implements used in the ceremony.
A special ware was used for the tea bowls termed Raku ware. It is said first to have been made by a Kioto potter Ameya from a design by Rikiu, and so delighted Hideyoshi that he presented the maker with a gold seal, with the characters “Raku” (enjoyment) inscribed upon it, with permission to use it as a stamp. The ware is soft and porous, and covered with a thick, soft glaze. Not turned on the wheel but shaped by hand, it is rough and uneven in shape, and usually bears no ornamentation. Coarse and unsightly and rough as it may appear to the uninitiated, to the eye of the connoisseur it possesses many beauties; its irregular shape is comfortable to the hand, its soft glaze pleasant to the lips, and is said even to impart a flavour to the tea.
As the relaxation of the most cultured of the land, the tea ceremony had effects of far-reaching importance. As a corrective to the military spirit its glorification of the gentler virtues was invaluable, and to it in no small degree it is said the Japanese owe their character as the most courteous nation in the world. In art, though most strongly felt in the field of Keramics, its influence extended widely, affecting to no small extent the various branches of the minor decorative arts, and dominating, almost in a sense creating, the arts of landscape gardening and flower arrangement.
With Hideyoshi’s revival of the tea ceremony, and the importation of Korean potters, the real history of Japanese Keramic art begins. Kilns were founded in many different parts of the country, and as each produced its own distinctive ware the development of these local art industries can best be traced separately.
The province of Hizen, lying in the south of the island of Kiushu, and the nearest point of the Korean mainland being only some two hundred miles away, it is natural that here the borrowed industry should first take root.
The most ancient kiln was erected at Karatzu as early as the seventh century, and a hundred years later glazing was there used for the first time in Japan. So famous did the Karatzu ware become that Karatzu-mono, “things of Karatzu,” became the current name for all sorts of pottery. The Old Karatzu ware, however, was coarse and rough in quality, though some of its rich brown glazes were not without beauty.
In the sixteenth century Gorodayu Shonzui visited China and learned the art of making porcelain, and on his return to Japan brought a quantity of the clay with him. On the supply being exhausted, however, the manufacture stopped.
After Hideyoshi’s invasion of Korea, towards the end of the century, many captives were brought back, including a Korean potter, Risampei, who discovered on the hills of Hizen a clay suitable for the making of porcelain. Kilns were erected, and the new manufacture started in earnest.
When the Dutch traders dealt with the port of Nagasaki the chief article of their export was the porcelain ware of Arita—known as Imari ware, from which port it was shipped to Nagasaki.
It is this ware that was distributed through Europe and gave the first and totally erroneous idea of the Keramic art of Japan. For the “Old Japan” ware, as it is called, was deliberately manufactured to suit the vulgar taste of the barbarous foreigner, who demanded copious and crowded decoration. It is almost ludicrous to compare it with the ware manufactured at the same time for home use. The one, the work of the artist Kakiyemon, is decorated with dainty and graceful designs, which in their reticence and simplicity are the embodiment of good taste; the other is quite un-Japanese in style, the ornament crowded and overloaded with colour, and often a mere gaudy jumble. But the “Old Japan” ware formed the models for half the factories of Europe, and we only need to turn to the Old Crown Derby porcelain to find its atrocities repeated with ludicrous fidelity.
In 1660 Prince Nabeshima established a kiln at Okawachi. It was reserved for the finest porcelain only, which was made for his private use, the sale being prohibited. Beautiful ware with a fine blue under the glaze was the chief product, and at a later date fragile imitations of flowers were made, of wonderful delicacy.