Material · ceramic
Porcelain
East Asia
Porcelain is the white, translucent, high-fired ceramic of China from the Tang period onward, perfected at Jingdezhen in the Yuan and Ming with blue-and-white and later famille-rose decoration, and imitated in Europe from 1710. It was the greatest export ware in history. Reign marks and decoration date it.
| Kind | ceramic |
|---|---|
| Regions | East Asia |
Sources
Kaolin and petuntse at Jingdezhen in Jiangxi and at Dehua in Fujian supplied China; Meissen and Limoges developed European sources. Jingdezhen has been the porcelain capital of China for over a thousand years.
Identification
Porcelain is white, translucent in thin sections, vitrified and rings clearly when struck; underglaze blue, overglaze enamels and reign marks are its features. Ming and Qing bodies differ in whiteness and foot finish. Soft-paste European porcelain is chalkier.
Substitutes and fakes
Reign marks are copied on later and modern wares as a matter of course and prove nothing; reproductions of Ming and Qing porcelain are made at Jingdezhen today. Foot rim wear, glaze and painting style are the checks.
Elsewhere
- Wikidata: Q130693
- Wikipedia: porcelain
Cite this article
Stratum Study. "Porcelain" (Material). Stratum Study pack 2026.09, as of 2026-09-21. https://stratum.black/study/materials/porcelain. Accessed 2026-09-21.
@misc{stratum-porcelain,
title = {Porcelain},
author = {{Stratum Study}},
howpublished = {\url{https://stratum.black/study/materials/porcelain}},
year = {2026},
note = {Material article, Stratum Study pack 2026.09, as of 2026-09-21; sources: stratum, wikidata. Accessed 2026-09-21.}
} Citations carry the pack version and the article's as-of date so they resolve to the same text later. The facts themselves belong to the sources listed below; cite those for the science.