Old time pottery

Before entering the world of old time pottery, a few words about pottery must be said. Pottery comprises three distinctive types of ceramics .

Earthenware is the first type of pottery has been manufactured using the same basic techniques since ancient times.

Encyclopedia Britannica defines earthenware as “pottery that has not been fired to the point of vitrification and is thus slightly porous and coarser than stoneware and porcelain”.

Stoneware is a category of clay and a type of ceramic distinguished primarily by its firing and maturation temperature (from about 1200 C% to 1315 C%). In other therms, it is man made stone. One widely recognized definition is : “hard pottery made from siliceous paste, fired at high temperature to vitrify (make glassy) the body” - from the Columbia Encyclopedia, 2007

The third type of pottery, the porcelain, was invented by the Chinese. The Chinese called it gaolin, meaning High Hill, refering to the place where the substance was found for the first time: Jingdhesen, Jiangxi, China.

The porcelain is made in kilns, thermally insulated chambers, at temperatures between 1200 C% and 1400 C% .

It is believed that Chinese potters first made porcelain during the Han period (206 BC-AD 220), when pottery techniques became more refined.

The name porcelain comes from the old Italian word porcella (little pig). Porcella was used for the white and shiny cowry resemblant to the porcelain.