MARTIN, DR., Note on a Sassanian Ewer, _Burlington Magazine_, September, 1912. MEYER, A. B., "On the Celadon Question," _Oesterreichische Monatsschrift_, January, 1885, etc. MORGAN, J. P., Catalogue of the Morgan Collection of Chinese Porcelains, by S.W. Bushell and W.M. Laffan. New York, 1907. PARIS, Exposition universelle de 1878, Catalogue spécial de la Collection Chinoise. PERZYNSKI, F., "Towards a Grouping of Chinese Porcelain," _Burlington Magazine_, October and December, 1910, etc. PERZYNSKI, F., "Jagd auf Götter," in the _Neue Rundschau_, October, 1913. PERZYNSKI, F., on T´ang Forgeries, _Ostasiatischer Zeitschrift_, January, 1914. READ, C. H., in _Man_, 1901, No. 15, "On a T´ang Vase and Two Mirrors from a Tomb in Shensi." REINAUD, M., "Relation des Voyages faits par les Arabes et les Persans dans l'Inde et à la Chine dans la IX⚭ siècle de l'ére chrétienne." Paris, 1845. SOLON, L., "The Noble Buccaros," North Staffordshire Literary and Philosophic Society, October 23rd, 1896. TORRANCE, REV. TH., "Burial Customs in Szechuan," Journal of the N. China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. XLI., 1910, p. 58. VORETZSCH, E. A., Hamburgisches Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Führer durch eine Ausstellung Chinesischer Kunst, 1913. WILLIAMS, MRS. R. S., Introductory Note to the Catalogue of a Loan Exhibition of Chinese, Corean, and Japanese Potteries held by the Japan Society of New York, 1914. ZIMMERMANN, E., "Wann ist das Chinesische Porzellan erfunden und wer war sein Erfinder?" _Orientalisches Archiv. Sonderabdruck._ CHINESE POTTERY AND PORCELAIN CHAPTER I THE PRIMITIVE PERIODS POTTERY, as one of the first necessities of mankind, is among the earliest of human inventions. In a rude form it is found with the implements of the late Stone Age, before there is any evidence of the use of metals, and all attempts to reconstruct the first stages of its discovery are based on conjecture alone. We have no knowledge of a Stone Age in China, but it may be safely assumed that pottery there, as elsewhere, goes back far into prehistoric times. Its invention is ascribed to the mythical Shên-nung, the Triptolemus of China, who is supposed to have initiated the people in the cultivation of the soil and other necessary arts of life. Huang Ti, the semi-legendary yellow emperor, in whose reign the cyclical system of chronology began (2697 B.C.), is said to have appointed "a superintendent of pottery, K´un-wu, who made pottery," and it was a commonplace in the oldest Chinese literature[6] that the great and good emperor Yü Ti Shun (2317-2208 B.C.) "highly esteemed pottery." Indeed, the Han historian Ssŭ-ma Ch´ien (163-85 B.C.) assures us that Shun himself, before ascending the throne, "fashioned pottery at Ho-pin," and, needless to say, the vessels made at Ho-pin were "without flaw."