Nantou pottery

Forms, use and context#

A Control Yuan report, citing local histories, dates it to 1796, when people near Niuyunku (牛運堀) in today's Nantou City used local clay for bricks and tiles; three kilns making daily ware followed from 1821. The Shuili snake kiln, built in 1927, made water jars and teapots and is now a ceramics park. A 1984 magazine report says a ceramist found Nantou clay suitable for teapots.

Methods#

1. Snake kiln (蛇窯) A long, single-chamber kiln laid up a slope, fired with wood; the Shuili kiln took about 16,000 kg of wood per firing.²
2. Snake kiln, length The Shuili kiln is about 30 m long.³

With tea#

• The Shuili kiln's historic products were large water jars and teapots with hand-attached spouts.²
• A 1984 report on teapots says a ceramist tested Taiwanese clays and found Nantou clay suitable for teapots.⁴
• A Nantou workshop made pottery on a 朱泥 (red clay) body.⁵
• The Yingge museum's 2018 Yixing issue names Nantou, with Yingge, as a place where Yixing-style red-clay pots were made.⁶
• The Nantou pottery display hall in the county cultural park (opened 1997) holds about 800 pieces, tea sets among them.¹

Periods#

1. 1796 – 1895Bricks and tiles from 1796; from 1821 three kilns (頭窯, 中窯, 尾窯) made daily ware, and their names later became place names. No individual founder is named in the report.¹
2. 1895 – 1945Japanese rule: Japanese capital and potters expanded the trade, and Nantou pottery (南投燒) was a noted product of Taichū Prefecture.¹
3. 1927 – presentThe Shuili snake kiln opens; wood-fired with sawmill offcuts and river driftwood; plastic jars displace its water jars from about 1978; it becomes Taiwan's first ceramics culture park on 12 November 1993 and is rebuilt after the 1999 earthquake.²

Kiln sites#

Related#