When a piece of official kiln porcelain with a purple mouth and iron foot was sold at auction for more than 100 million yuan, people could not help but ask: how could this mysterious purple rim and iron-colored foot fascinate collectors around the world for 800 years? As the pinnacle of Song Dynasty kilns, the purple rim and iron foot is not only a symbol of craftsmanship and aesthetics, but also a living fossil of ancient Chinese porcelain making technology. Today, we will travel through time and space to unveil the historical codes behind this legendary kiln.
First, the birth of the purple mouth and iron feet: a glaze and tire bone of the conversation
Northern Song Huizong years, the official kiln porcelain was given an unprecedented artistic mission. In order to meet the royal pursuit of minimalist aesthetics, craftsmen created the unique process of “purple mouth and iron foot”: the mouth of the object because of the thin glaze layer through the deep purple tire color, the foot of the high temperature firing to form the iron brown texture. This seemingly unintentional “defective aesthetics” is in fact the perfect fusion of Song literati aesthetics and artisan wisdom.
Modern scientific tests show that the formation of the purple mouth originates from the secondary oxidation of iron in the clay during firing, while the iron foot is the result of the quenching of the tire bone, which contains up to 8% iron, in the reducing flame. Each glaze color changes, are implied in the Song dynasty kiln workers on the precise control of the fire – temperature deviation of more than 20 ℃, will not be able to present this “heavenly work of art” wonderful effect.
Second, the official kiln system of power branding
As the core features of the Southern Song Xiu Nei Si official kilns, purple mouth and iron foot porcelain from the beginning of the birth of a strong class symbols. The history of the Song Dynasty – food and goods records, official kilns need to “for the emperor to choose back, and then allowed to sell”, the defective products must be smashed and buried. 2014 Hangzhou Tiger Cave kiln site unearthed 240,000 pieces of porcelain, less than ten pieces of intact ware, confirming the harsh standards of imperial porcelain.
Different from the blossoming of the folk kilns, the official kilns purple mouth and iron foot objects have always maintained a unified form of norms: koi mouth bowls, string pattern vase, three-footed furnace and other ceremonial ware accounted for more than 70%. This standardized production is both an extension of the imperial aesthetic and promotes the systematic inheritance of glaze formulas. It is worth noting that some of the objects on the inside of the wall there is also “Neifu” “Hall” and other ink inscription, become a study of the Song dynasty palace use of precious evidence.
Third, the gold wire: natural open piece of the philosophical metaphor
If the purple mouth iron foot is the official kiln “identity card”, then the gold wire is its soul. Craftsmen use the difference between the expansion coefficient of the tire glaze, in the cooling process to form a network of ice cracks. This concept of “flaws are perfection” coincides with the Song Dynasty’s Cheng-Zhu philosophy of “materialism and knowledge”.
Sotheby’s 2018 auction of the official kiln eight square string pattern dish mouth vase, the body of the open piece as dense as a spider’s web, but not the slightest sense of cleavage. This “heaven and man” visual effect, from the unique agate into the glaze process – the crushed agate into the glaze, so that the glaze produces a warm jade texture. Scientific and technological testing shows that this type of glaze silica content of up to 70%, and modern optical glass composition is amazingly similar.
Fourth, from the palace secret to cultural totems
Purple mouth iron foot kiln influence has long exceeded the object itself. Yuan dynasty “south kiln notes” said it “clarified clay for the model, extremely delicate”, the Ming dynasty Wen Zhenheng in the “long things” will be listed as the first study room. The Qianlong emperor spared no expense in copying it, and the seal script mark “Qing dynasty Qianlong imitation of antiquity” can still be seen on the bottom of an imitation of an official-glazed three-goat vase that exists in the National Palace in Taipei.
In the contemporary art market, the scarcity of the Song dynasty official kiln has made it become the top collectors of “hard currency”. 2021 Christie’s Hong Kong autumn auction, a small wash of official kiln of only 12 cm high to 203 million Hong Kong dollars, the price of each gram of gold more than 400 times. Behind this crazy figure is the collective recognition of the millennium cultural genes.
Fifth, scientific and technological archaeology to unravel the millennium puzzle
With the intervention of modern testing technology, purple mouth and iron foot official kiln of the unsolved mystery is being gradually cracked. x-ray fluorescence analysis shows that the Hangzhou suburb under the official kiln soil aluminum content than the Jingdezhen kaolin 15% higher, which is the core secret of its tire bone firm. The thermoluminescence dating technology confirms that the earliest surviving authentic pieces can be traced back to the Chunxi period of the Southern Song Dynasty.
3D modeling restored the lost peg-firing process: craftsmen used 5-7 sesame seed-sized pegs to support the objects, ensuring full glaze firing while minimizing contact points. This ingenuity makes even modern engineers marvel at the microscopic control of the ancients.
