We can find nothing in the Japanese records to throw light on the porcelain made in Hizen during the first half of the seventeenth century, but much of the somewhat roughly decorated blue and white ware (the larger dishes especially, made for India and Persia) has been classed, on the ground of the occurrence of spur-marks, and of the nature of the paste and decoration, as Japanese.[115] Some of this ware may be as old as this time, when (I mean shortly before the middle of the seventeenth century) the demand from the West was ever increasing, and the Chinese supply was so uncertain and so inferior in quality.
Meantime the Dutch and English factories on the island of Hirado, opposite to the pottery district of Imari, were finally closed (1641), and all communication with the outside world prohibited. The only exception made was in favour of the strictly limited commerce carried on through the Dutch and Chinese merchants, who were confined in their prison-like factories at Nagasaki.[116]
Now it is a remarkable fact that our first definite information concerning the introduction of Japanese porcelain into Europe dates from this very period, and it is to approximately the same date that the Japanese ascribe the introduction of coloured enamels among the Hizen potters. One Higashidori Tokuzayemon, a potter of Imari, is said to have derived some knowledge of the precious secret from the captain of a Chinese junk trading at Nagasaki in 1648. With the assistance of Kakiyemon, a skilled potter of the same district, he succeeded in imitating the five-coloured enamelled wares of the Wan-li period. Another Japanese authority[117] gives the name of his assistant as Gosu Gombei, and states that by 1645, after many fruitless experiments, they were able to produce a ware decorated with coloured enamels and with gold and silver, which was exported at first through the medium of a Chinese merchant, and shortly after sold to the Dutch.
So far from Japanese sources. On the other hand, we hear of an early Dutch ambassador sent from Batavia—‘Le Sieur Wagenaar, grand connoisseur et fort habile dans ces sortes d‘œuvres‘—in fact himself a designer of patterns, one of which, it is said—white flowers on a blue ground—found great favour at this time. In the same work[118] we are told that this gentleman, who combined the most delicate diplomatic negotiations with practical commercial undertakings, took back with him to Batavia more than twenty thousand pieces of plain white ware (1634-35). It is, however, very probable that the Dutch may have had a great deal to do with the introduction of coloured enamels into Japan.
We must remember that during this time (say between 1630 and 1650) two important series of events were coming to pass which revolutionised the Eastern trade. These were, first, in China the troubles attending the expulsion of the Ming dynasty, including the burning of King-te-chen and the stoppage of the supply of porcelain for shipping at Canton; and secondly, the final triumph of the anti-Christian party in Japan, and the closing of the country to foreigners. It is no wonder, then, if the Dutch ambassador was empowered to offer almost any terms to the Japanese, provided that the latter would only make an exception in favour of the merchants of his country.
Turning now from the records of the Japanese and of the Dutch merchants, let us examine the specimens of Japanese porcelain that we find in our oldest European collections, and which we may reasonably assign to the seventeenth century. Apart from the blue and white, we find here two classes of enamelled ware which we now know to be of Japanese origin.
PLATE XXIII. JAPANESE, KAKIYEMON ENAMELLED WARE
It may indeed be said that it was in the separation, and in the definite attribution to Japan, of these two groups, that the first step was made towards a scientific classification of Oriental porcelain, and for this work we are chiefly indebted to the labours of the late Sir A. W. Franks. We will first deal with what may on the whole be regarded as the oldest group.