"kantei" For Unknown Tokuri

[ken kata]

Good Morning Gentlemen,

 

I got this old Sake Bottle last year.

I thought it would be a interesting discussion, "as to" what it is.

 

The features that capture my attention, is;

 

1) The old  Blue and White color scheme. Could this color combination be referred to, as, "Somesuki" / Mono Chrome?

 

2) The "Old"  Impressionistic style of the Brush Strokes of the Bamboo Leaves. ( I love those Japanese Bamboo Leaf designs)

 

3) The Thermo  Stress Cracking on the surface.

   One person on a video said it reminds him of the street patterns on a city map.

   I thought it looked like the Rock Wall Foundations of Japanese Castles.

 

4) The Cloth/Fiber weave pattern on the bottom face. 

 

5) The Wabi-Sabi , Hand-made appearance.

      Can you imagine of they took a "culture swab" , to see what kind of residue is still in the crevasses or inside the bottle?

     They might , actually tell where that bottle was/came from  and who touched it. 

 

6) The body of the Tokuri has a "lumpy" surface, and, small depressions, like "Where your Fingers and Palm would fit right in".

 

I would like to know what you gentlemen "see" ( Your thoughts) and what you feel the time period and where it might have come from.

 

Thanks for viewing..

Alton

[ROKUJURO]

Alton,

if I see the colours correctly, the underglaze cobalt is probably of the old GOSU type. In early time in Japan, this was made from a stone containing cobalt, but it contained also small amounts of manganese and iron. This lead to a "softer" blue with a greyish hue. This stone came from quarries high up in the mountains, and when these were exhausted already in medieval times, smaller stones containing these minerals (then called KAWAISHI) were still found in the rivers. But as these became more and more difficult to obtain, some potters even took unusual measures, stealing tombstones (made from this stone) from graveyards!

Later, the cobalt was supplied from mines in Persia which was much purer and had higher cobalt content, resulting in a strong, 'hard' blue as we know it from later porcelains.

So, to make a long story come to an end, I think that this is probably an older piece of ceramic, dating to the 17th century at earliest. But I have also to say that the old GOSU type was copied/re-composed, so it is difficult to give a safe assessment. The same applies to the foot. The technique of using a coarse textile to prevent sticking to the working plate is known from Japan, but also from south-east Asia and Korea. 

[ken kata]

Jean,

Thanks for the insight of the Cobalt. I was searching the 'net for info. I did not know the Glazes was causing health and "growing"  legal issues.

[ROKUJURO]

Alton,

it was not the glaze itself, but the decoration painting material. The glaze on your TOKKURI is probably a simple feldspar glaze with high rice-hull ash content.

As this TOKKURI was very probably raw glazed (no biscuit firing), the GOSU decoration was painted on the raw glaze.

Cobalt can be a dangerous substance when it has been transformed in radioactive plants or laboratories, but radioactive isotopes do normally not occur in nature. However, it is suspected to cause lung cancer when you inhale it. 

"Trapped" in a glaze, cobalt is not harmful at all.   

[Guido]

6) The body of the Tokuri has a "lumpy" surface, and, small depressions, like "Where your Fingers and Palm would fit right in".

 

Sorry, couldn't resist :

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4yBvvGi_2A

[Bazza]

HAHAHAHA - I allus reads a Guido comment (a) because it is erudite and highly knowledgeable, OR (b) because the humouresque content is side-splitting.  As a banana aficionado the extemporized description was brilliant, well-suited to a tokuri.

 

BaZZa.

[Bugyotsuji]

Lovely object, with round mouth and no pouring lip.

 

N.B. Japanese notes.

 

徳利 とっくり　　Looks like it should be Tokuri, but actually pronounced Tock-kuri, normally shortened to Tokkuri in English. See ROKUJURO's 'TOKKURI' above.

 

染付き　そめつき　pronounced Sommay'+tsuki, normally written Sometsuki in English = application of dye.