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Form And Decoration Of Pottery:
Hard-paste. A term applied by European potters to a pottery clay made with a base of kaolin, a material used by the Chinese in making true porcelain, and not discovered in Europe until 1709.
Luster. A pottery Decoration producing metallic hues formed by thin layers of gold, copper, silver, etc.
On-the-glaze colors. Refers to colors applied on top of glazed ware, such as the enamels used in majolica pottery.Great age of porcelains, jades, and cut stone, with elaboration of form and Decoration of pottery. Extensive trade with Europe. The last two Chinese dynasties were those that greatly influenced Western art in the 18th century, because of the exportations of pottery to England and France. The Ming dynasty (1368-1644). During the Ming dynasty all the arts received great encouragement from the emperors. The advancement in the making of porcelain was designated by a greater variety of beautiful colors. Plain-colored glazes, which had, in previous dynasties, furnished the chief decoration, were supplanted in popular favor by monochrome pattern decorations, although the plain glazes continued to be used side by side with more ornate pottery. New motifs such as birds and fish were added to the old floral patterns. This was the period of the blue-and-white porcelains, in which flower patterns in several shades of blue were placed on a cream-colored field and the whole covered with a glaze of a very faint bluish tinge. These were the porcelains that were popular with the Europeans and that had a great influence on English porcelain. Occasionally the colors were reversed and white flowers were placed on a blue background. In the latter part of the Ming period, additional variety in the technique of color Decoration was developed, and the beginning of polychrome Decoration was evident in Ming enamelled ware and in Ming "three-color" ware, which took its name from its patterns wrought in the combinations of three colors. These colors were usually selected from a palette of dark violet-blue, turquoise, aubergine-purple, yellow,and white.
Extensive settlement, however, becomes visible only with the agricultural settlements of the Neolithic period. After about 6000 B. c. farmers who did use pottery lived in most areas of Greece, Crete, and some Aegean islands. Coastal settlements also engaged in fishing and seafaring for obsidian. Fanners cultivated wheat and barley and had domesticated dogs, goats, sheep, and other animals. They probably learned these skills from the Near East, along with styles of pottery Decoration and the making of female figurines.
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