Whence
Porcelain
Invention

Where does Porcelain come from?

Porcelain comes from China, where potters spent centuries perfecting a hard, white ceramic that lets light shine through. Europe could only import it, treasure it and try to copy it until the early 1700s, which is why English still calls it china.

Centuries in Chinese kilns

Porcelain is made from raw materials that usually include kaolin clay, fired at 1,200 to 1,400 °C, heat that makes it strong and translucent. Chinese potters reached it step by step. Early 'proto-porcelain' goes back to the Shang dynasty (1600–1046 BCE). By the Eastern Han dynasty (25–220 CE) glazed wares had become high-fired porcelain, and by the late Sui and early Tang dynasties potters had achieved the whiteness and translucency expected today. Depending on the definition, the technology matured between about 200 and 800 CE.

A treasure for trade

Chinese porcelain was already exported to the Islamic world under the Tang, where it was highly prized. By the Song dynasty (960–1279) dragon kilns could fire as many as 25,000 pieces at a time. Under the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) wares such as the famous blue-and-white reached Asia, Africa and Europe, and in 1517 Portuguese merchants began trading directly with China by sea. The first European to mention porcelain was Marco Polo, in the 13th century.

Europe cracks the secret

For centuries European potters made only imitations, such as soft-paste wares that were not true porcelain. The breakthrough came in Germany: a workshop note records the first hard, white European porcelain in 1708, made under Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus. He died that year, and in 1709 his assistant Johann Friedrich Böttger, a pharmacist turned alchemist, reported the success. The Meissen factory opened in 1710. English had already named the ware china, short for China-ware, by the 1650s.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org ↗ · etymonline.com › porcelain ↗ · etymonline.com › china ↗

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