Riding the wind of rebirth

“When rouge color first appeared, it was extremely precious. Not only did it come from thousands of miles away overseas, but the colorant was gold. Although the color produced after firing was very different from that of gold, the cost was there, so the craftsmanship that could be matched with rouge color was basically the top-level craftsmanship at the time. Therefore, rouge purple objects must be very rare objects.” Old Master Qi couldn’t help shaking his head as he spoke.

"It's not just rouge purple. Magenta is called rouge color because it has a slightly reddish hue after firing, which is very similar to rouge, hence the name." Mr. Wang said, "Because the glaze is very precious, this hue was only occasionally used in enamel painting during the Kangxi period. Craftsmen found that if they adjusted the subtle ratio of lead boron flux and gold, they could get a light pink or red-purple color."

"In the enamel colors of the time, carmine appeared as a light rose color, or a rich ruby-like carmine color, or a purple Su Fang color."

"We all know that the enameled porcelains of the Kangxi and Yongzheng dynasties were made by Jingdezhen porcelain factory, and then sent to Beijing for painting and firing by the Imperial Household Department. The craftsmanship was the best in the world at that time. Therefore, not only rouge purple, but also rouge water or rouge red, such as baby face, pink, and chili red, will be sold out at first sight. It is impossible for them to appear in the ghost market. Even if they occasionally appear, it is impossible for them to remain unsold for a long time."

Zhou Zhi covered his mouth and smiled slyly: "What a close call, luckily this piece is from the Yongzheng period. If it was enamel, it would definitely not be my turn."

"This thing has actually become quite famous in Daliushu recently." Ma Ye turned the plate over, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. "It's mainly because of the hasty four-character inscription in cinnabar on this pastel peach. It's too ridiculous."

"This is not nonsense." Grandpa Qi said, "In fact, there are only a dozen pieces of porcelain in that batch. The problem of the inscription has puzzled us for a long time, but there is no record in the internal work files, so we don't know the specific cause."

Old Master Wang blamed Master Ma: "Others may not know, but how come you don't know? Back then, Master Qi and I wrote a report to the National Cultural Relics Appraisal Committee for those porcelains in Liaoning."

"God, please forgive me!" Master Ma cried out, "I came back and immediately asked all the senior and junior students in the Porcelain Institute, but none of them knew! Later I learned that you were in the calligraphy and painting group at the time, and you wrote a report to manage the affairs of the Porcelain Group. That report was suppressed and not announced to the whole country!"

"Then how did Elbow know that?" Mr. Wang asked back.

"Ah this..."

"Ahem..." Zhou Zhi hurriedly tried to smooth things over for Master Ma: "Actually, I know this is purely a coincidence. I found it when I was studying the calligraphy and painting survey reports that you two left behind. The article was sandwiched between the calligraphy and painting survey reports. I guess the porcelain group didn't know about it, and the calligraphy and painting group didn't pay much attention to it. In addition, the batch of materials was not published. I asked Master Ma to find someone to copy it for me. I guess the brothers who kept the batch of reports were all studying calligraphy and painting, and they really didn't pay attention to this."

"Actually, I have another question."

"Oh?" Several people were immediately attracted: "What's the question?"

"I wonder if people at that time had already discovered the potential harm that the minerals in porcelain glazes could cause to the human body?"

"Why do you say that?" "Look, this porcelain has already had the glaze applied to the outside of the porcelain, where it doesn't come in direct contact with the food." Zhou Zhi turned the plate over again: "The inside is white, with only a small amount of pastel decoration. From the composition point of view, it won't have any effect on the human body."

"So could it be that people at that time had intentionally used underglaze colors for parts that could come into direct contact with food, and used low-temperature overglaze colors as decorative parts that would not come into direct contact with food?"

"Hahaha, we haven't considered your idea before." Old Master Wang laughed and said, "But it's not reliable."

Mr. Qi said: "I think it is more of an aesthetic relationship. The outside of the container is bright and the inside is light. Obviously, the brighter inside is more in line with people's habits and aesthetics than the lighter outside. This is one reason. Another reason is that when cleaning, the inside will be scraped harder than the outside, and the overglaze color is easier to fall off than the underglaze color. This is the second reason."

"Yes, the idea is a bit far-fetched." Grandpa Wang said, "At least we haven't seen any records about this. Moreover, many porcelains, such as wall branches, plates and dishes with pastel enamel, and three generations of imperial porcelain in pine stone, all show that the ancients did not shy away from using overglaze colors for the interior. In addition, in order to strengthen the interior, they specially invented the method of shallow engraving before coloring, which not only achieved a shallow relief effect on the inside and outside of the object, but also achieved the effect of fixing the color. If they were taboo about this, why did they invent the process of inner engraving?"

"Yeah, I'm being too picky." Zhou Zhi suddenly realized.

"Mr. Gu has also mentioned your question to me." Mr. Wang smiled and said, "Let me enlighten you when I have time. Your knowledge is quite broad. At least in terms of science knowledge, you are much better than us old people. You attach importance to logical connection and the combination of literature and science. These are all good ways of thinking."

"But there is still a little difference between science and liberal arts. In science, you can first propose many conjectures and then prove them step by step, but have you ever heard of such and such conjectures in liberal arts?"

Zhou Zhi was suddenly shocked, as if it was really the case, such as the Goldbach conjecture and Model conjecture in mathematics, but the humanities seemed to have not heard of various fantastic conjectures. Most of them were restored based on archaeology and literature. Even if they were conjectures, they were also structures under extremely sufficient conditions.

A loud drum doesn't need a heavy hammer. Seeing that Zhou Zhi understood a little, Old Man Wang said, "Your master said that your mind wanders and sometimes you go too far. For example, the recent connection between ancient Yi script and many Neolithic carvings is actually a bit premature."

"There is currently insufficient research on ancient Yi script in the country, at least it is far from the level of Chinese characters. Therefore, it is difficult to have a strong persuasive argument when talking about its connection with Neolithic carvings without sufficient foundation. And the 'invention' such as Anning River Valley being the hometown of Zhuanxu lacks empirical evidence."

This school of Kung Fu has always emphasized research over writing. After hearing what Grandpa Wang said, Zhou Zhi realized that he was really far away from the style of his master, and he couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat.

"However, Mr. Gu still recognizes your research on oracle bone inscriptions. We also recognize it. It is very solid! Especially the root analysis and research, all of which are based on existing data and can withstand the most rigorous scrutiny." Mr. Qi quickly fed him a sweet date: "It shows that you still know the importance of things."

"But you still need to be more rigorous in academics, otherwise people will find out when you are in a situation and use your small mistakes to negate everything you have said." Old Master Wang taught Zhou Zhi earnestly: "This kind of thing is entirely possible, so we still need to nip it in the bud." (End of this chapter)