Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 8.djvu/321

 on the left bank of the Kiso River. It was opened in 1752, and from that time until 1810 the various faiences for which the province was celebrated were manufactured there. These pieces are to be identified only by the mark (Inu-yama). The ware was called either Inuyama-yaki or Kenzan-yaki (Kenzan being another method of pronouncing the ideographs inu-yama). In 1810 the factory was moved to Maru-yama, east of the castle, and the ware was thenceforth known as Maru-yama-yaki. About this time, or a little later, porcelain began to be included among the Maruyama products. It was, however, decorated only with blue under the glaze. Not till 1835 did a potter called Michihei introduce the fashion of sur-couverte decoration. He took as his model a peculiarly rough Chinese porcelain (known in Japan as Gosu-aka-e), which was valued by the tea-clubs on account of its bold designs and antique associations. This variety of the Maru-yama-yaki—or Inu-yama-yaki, as it is popularly but erroneously called—may be described as thick and somewhat clumsy porcelain, having a solid, lustrous glaze, and decorated with archaic designs in blue sous couverte, and red ochre, green, and gold over the glaze. It is not a manufacture of any beauty or merit, and it may be dismissed, as may also the subsequent story of the Maruyama factory, by saying that the recent productions of the latter are faience of the rudest type.

Shortly subsequent to, or perhaps contemporaneous with, this new departure by Michihei at Maruyama, an expert called Kawamoto Jihei (better known by his mark, Sosendo) began to employ vitrifiable enamels. The style adopted bore some resemblance, in point of design, to that of the Nabeshima factories, but the