of 1815, that Europe and America first became aware of the possible existence of an ‘imperial kiln’ or group of kilns at Ching-te Chen 
Nor was this all, for according to Julien's translation such an ‘imperial kiln’ was established in the year 1369, the second year of the Hung-wu 
period. In view of Julien's standing in his own time, it is not unnatural that the facts as recorded by him with regard to this important event should have remained virtually unchallenged for the better part of a century. Jacquemart, in his monumental 
by Lan P'u 
with the preface date 1815. The work was later revised by his nephew Chêng T'ing-kuei 
The edition used is the reprint of 1891.
by Chu Yen 
in 6 chüan, published in 1774. The edition used is the reprint of 1914. Stephen W. Bushell, Description of Chinese pottery and porcelain being a translation of the T'ao-shuo, with introduction, notes and bibliography, Oxford, 1910.
He was lent a copy of the 1823 edition of Ch'iao Chu 
in 22 chiian by the then director of the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris. It has not been possible to trace this copy.
section of the monograph on natural resources, f.l r/v in the manuscript copy made for Sir Percival David from the edition of 1740, compiled by Li Chien-tê 
This edition differs fundamentally from the K'ang-hsi edition of 1682 by Wang Lin-yüan 
to which all other references in this paper have been made. Bushell's borrowed copy of the 1823 edition would have been nearer to the edition of 1740, so for this reference alone the Ch'ien-lung edition has been preferred.
by Wang Tsung-mu 
of 1556 and issued with supplements in the Wan-li period not earlier than 1590.
‘Oriental Ceramics’, viii, 1, 1936. Jenyns unfortunately gives the volume as 3 and omits the page references. Ozaki at that time believed (pp. 29–30) that there were historical reasons for accepting the thirty-fifth year of Hung-wu (1402), but does not discuss these. Later in his Mindai no tōji 
‘Ceramics of the Ming period’, Tokyo, 1942, he expresses a new view (pp. 7–8). It is that the first date is too early, and the second too late, and that what has happened has been to write 
‘thirty-fifth’ instead of twenty-fifth 
He refers to the Ta Ming hui-tien 
, ch. 194 (see Chung-wén shu-chü edition 
Taipei, 1963, vol. v, p. 2631, lb) to a passage dated to the twenty-sixth year concerned with the manufacture of porcelain vessels for ‘general use’ 
the requirements for which were to be estimated in terms of men and materials, and he interprets the passage as meaning that the kilns were established in 1392, apparently regardless of the error of one year. What he does not seem to have realized at the time was that the phrase 
Ofy does not usually mean wares for use only in the imperial household, but wares intended for use throughout the palace precinct, in the storerooms and in the ministerial offices of the nei-fu 
As the Ta Ming hui-tien text continues in the next sentence ‘… if the requirements are large craftsmen should be moved to the capital and kilns set up; if they are small the wares should be made privately in Jao-chou fu and Ch'u-chou fu’, it is unlikely that at this time any wares were made at what is normally understood to mean an imperial kiln—one which produced wares of the highest quality, in accordance with a prescribed range of designs. The unskilled labour needed for brick and glazed tile making, which is also mentioned in the same passage, implies that budgeting economically was more important than making ‘imperial’ wares, which would have involved a considerable outlay of capital, as well as a careful reorganization of the labour force in order to achieve the high standards of craftsmanship that would be expected.
compiled by Chang T'ing-yü 
and others.
.
‘Draft history of the ceramics of Ching-tê Chên’ compiled by Chiang-hsi shéng ching-kung-yeh t'ing t'ao-tz'ū, yen-chü so-pien 
‘The Ceramic Research Department of the Chiang-hsi Province Light Industries Office’, Peking, 1959, 95–7. The only text referred to, and quoted from in these few pages, is the Fou-liang hsien-chih, but no indication is given of the edition used. As stated above, p. 327, n. 11, there are fundamental differences between various editions of this work, so that this compilation cannot, in its present form, be regarded as of any great value.
‘Catalogue of world ceramics’, xi, 1955. Although there is no reference to any ‘imperial kiln’ in the main body of the text, a chart at the end of the book includes both dates, 1369 and 1402, without comment.
‘Mindai lceitohu-ten yogyo no ikosatsu’ 
‘A study of the ceramic industry at Ching-tê Chen’, in Shimizu hakushi tsuitō kinen Mindai-shi ronsō 
‘Studies in Ming history in memory of Dr. Shimizu [Taiji]’, Tokyo, 1962, 457–87. Abbreviated to Mindai-shi ronsō.
Taipei, 1962, ch. 44, 0872, 8b. The Board of Rites submitted a memorial asking that all but one type of vessel out of a series of five, should be made of porcelain. This was agreed by the Emperor in the eighth month, i.e. September 1369. Nothing is recorded as to where these vessels were to be made, or about their colour, and there is no evidence that they were made immediately.
T'ao chi lüeh 
, included in Fou-liang hsien-chih of 1682 as T'ao-chi fu 
, ch. 4, 46b et seq.
ch. 28, 14a. The order of the characters of this book title appear to differ, perhaps from one edition to another, unless it has been wrongly quoted by both Sakuma and Ching-tê Chên t'ao-tz'ŭ shih-kao. The title given here is that in the Ku-yü ts'ung-shu 
of 1796 to which reference has been made.
by Ts'ao Chao 
. This work was completed in three chüan with the author's preface dated 1388. This extremely rare book was greatly expanded, and re-arranged in the fifteenth century by Wang Tso 
and it is generally to this later work that one is compelled to refer. Its value as a source-book is therefore questionable.
, compiled by Wang Hung-hsü 
who offered his ‘Draft history of the Ming’ to the throne in 1723.
‘The Shih-huo-chih of the Mingshih’: translated into Japanese with notes. Edited by Dr. Sei Wada (Tōyō Bunko Publications, ser. A, no. 40, 1957), Chinese and Japanese text. Vol. II, Japanese text, p. 1041. The Ming-shih kao exactly repeats this, see 2, 300c.
ch. 9, 0231, 4a. It is not yet known when the practice of marking porcelain with a nien-hao 
began, and there are none so far recorded of the Hung-wu period that can be regarded as genuine. The mark of Yung-lo (1402–24) is known, but is perhaps only genuine on a few pieces of white ware, and possibly on two small blue and white bowls, which were published by Ch'ên Wan-li 
in Ku-kung po-wu-yüan yüan-k'an 
‘Report of the Palace Museum’, no 1, 1958, p. 61. I have not seen these pieces, and the photographs so far published are unfortunately so indifferent that it is impossible to be sure about them. It is possible that the white pieces, which all seem to be bowls and stem-cups, were in fact made early in the Hsiian-te period and formed part of the order with which Chang Shan was concerned. Whatever the explanation, the number of marked pieces that may be attributed safely to the early fifteenth century must be far fewer than the number so far attributed to the period solely on the basis of the mark. It is, for instance, extremely unlikely that any of the so-called ‘bodiless’ type with an-hua 
decoration belong to the period; they should perhaps be assigned to the eighteenth century.
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