Beiliu Ceramics

Beiliu Ceramics

　　Beiliu Ceramics is one of the "Five Treasures of Beiliu." Its origins date back to the Xia and Shang dynasties, developed rapidly in the 1980s, and expanded significantly in recent years. Especially after the establishment of the Guangxi Beiliu Daily-Use Ceramics Industrial Park, the industry has grown rapidly and has become an important pillar supporting the region’s rapid economic development.

　　Over the years, Beiliu City has vigorously implemented an "internal strengthening and external attraction" development strategy—internally supporting and strengthening the daily-use ceramics industry to make it bigger and stronger, and externally introducing industrial ceramics, architectural ceramics, sanitary ware, and art ceramics to achieve diversified development of the ceramics industry. The city currently has 54 ceramics enterprises, including 31 large-scale enterprises, with an annual production capacity of over 1 billion pieces of white porcelain. The industry has fixed assets worth 1 billion yuan, employs more than 60,000 people, including over 3,000 professional technicians. In 2007, the city produced 1.135 billion pieces of daily-use ceramics, achieving an industrial output value of 2.063 billion yuan, product sales revenue of 1.96 billion yuan, tax revenue of 124 million yuan, and self-operated export earnings of 91.48 million US dollars. The production and operation of daily-use ceramics are standardized and internationalized. Products mainly include three categories: fine daily-use porcelain, stoneware, and high-end porcelain, covering nine major series including Chinese tableware, Western tableware, tea sets, coffee sets, aviation porcelain, hotel porcelain, travel gift porcelain, art porcelain, and microwave tableware, with over 2,000 varieties. Some products have reached advanced domestic industry and international standards, mainly exported to over 30 countries and regions in Europe, America, and Southeast Asia. Currently, Beiliu's daily-use ceramic output accounts for 26.3% of Guangxi’s total, and its export volume makes up 86% of the region’s total. It has become an emerging ceramics production area and an important export base in China, and is one of the country’s four major daily-use ceramic production areas.

　　Beiliu Ceramics – Unearthed from Lingdong Kiln Beiliu Ceramics – Unearthed from Lingdong Kiln

　　Beiliu Ceramics originated as early as the Xia and Shang dynasties. Based on existing archaeological data, it is certain that primitive pottery appeared in the Lingnan region during the middle and late Neolithic Age. The earliest known ancient human site in Beiliu—the "Liuma Village Stone Culture" in Xinxu—has yielded stone shovels and axes but no pottery artifacts. From the Xia Dynasty to the Shang Dynasty, with the advancement of agricultural production and the budding of private ownership, private pottery workshops emerged in the remote Beiliu River basin in southern China, though no artifacts from that time have been unearthed within Beiliu. Testing by the Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, found that these types of pottery had relatively high alumina content and were fired at high temperatures, exhibiting some properties of primitive porcelain. Such pottery artifacts have been unearthed within Beiliu; one example is a “rice-patterned pottery jar,” currently housed in the city museum, with a mouth diameter of 22.8 cm, height of 28.3 cm, and base diameter of 16.3 cm, though it has a small missing piece on the rim and a crack. This artifact confirms the prevalence of printed-pattern pottery in Beiliu at the time.

　　By the mid-Northern Song Dynasty, kilns were spread all over Guangxi, and the qingbai (bluish-white) kilns along the Beiliu River were particularly numerous. Downstream along the river, there were large-scale kiln sites in Beiliu’s Lingdong Village, Cangtian Village, and Wan Yao Village, Rongxian’s Chengguan and Dahu, Cenxi’s Nandu, and Tengxian’s Zhonghe—totaling over 200 kilns. Ancient ceramics expert Wei Renyi verified that the Lingdong Kiln, located at the source of the Beiliu River, was the most prominent in the region’s ceramics industry. The area’s abundant ceramic clay resources, forestry resources, and water power created optimal conditions for development. Even today, the legend of the “Ninety-Nine Kilns” persists in Lingdong. One can imagine that in Lingdong at the time, there were at least 1,000 waterwheels and 800 or more mills used for crushing porcelain stone, making clay, and glaze materials along streams and creeks. The spinning wheels and grinding stones created the spectacular scene described as “grinding wheels roar by the river, sounding like thunder before the rain.” In addition, exchanges with ceramic industries in places such as Jingdezhen, Jiangxi became increasingly frequent. Li Hongqing wrote in "Ceramics Unearthed in Guangxi": “The qingbai ceramics produced in the Beiliu River basin during the Song Dynasty could rival those of Jingdezhen, even surpassing them, earning the reputation of being the finest. One could say that the kiln clusters in the Beiliu River basin were the ‘secondary capital’ to Jingdezhen, China’s famed ‘Porcelain Capital.’” Thus, it is no surprise that the region reached its peak during this period.

　　Beiliu’s ceramics industry remained prosperous even in the late Song Dynasty. With the southward advance of the Yuan army, many northern ceramics artisans migrated to Guangdong and Guangxi. Kilns in Beiliu’s Lingdong, Cangtian, and Wan Yao Village absorbed techniques from various sources. Although output did not increase, product quality improved, producing a large number of fine, jade-like qingbai ceramics with diverse styles and unique shapes.

　　 Beiliu’s qingbai porcelain is stylistically closer to that of Jingdezhen. According to "A Preliminary Scientific Summary of Ceramic Techniques from Famous Kilns Throughout Chinese History," “Qingbai porcelain was produced in the Northern Song Dynasty in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi, as well as in Anhui, Fujian, and Chaozhou, but none matched the variety and beauty of those from the Zhonghe and Lingdong Kilns in the Beiliu River basin of Guangxi.” Impressions from porcelain stamps unearthed in Beiliu, such as those marked “Made by Li Wudu in the First Year of Jiading, Southern Song” and “Marked by Liang Erlang in the Second Year of Shaoxing, Year of Renxu,” are exquisitely crafted. Li Dejin from the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Cultural Relics Institute also believes that the large quantity of blue-and-white porcelain excavated from ancient Lingdong Kilns is the most in Guangxi and rare nationwide. In terms of quality, variety, and scale, they ranked among the best in the world at the time.

　　Among the incomplete Song Dynasty artifacts unearthed in Lingdong, some stamp patterns are intaglio, featuring designs such as lotus, chrysanthemum, and flying birds, bordered with meander patterns. The decorations are relatively simple and bold. The use of stacking firing methods accompanied these designs. Examples include the “Chunxi Second Year Intertwined Flower Leaf Pattern Bowl Stamp” and “Qingbai Chrysanthemum Pattern Porcelain Cup,” reflecting signs of decline in the late Southern Song Dynasty ceramics industry, where emphasis shifted toward quality amidst flourishing production.

　　The ceramics industry of the Song Dynasty gradually declined by the end of the period, but it had nonetheless reached its peak in Beiliu and even the Lingnan region during feudal times, creating the most brilliant and magnificent chapter in the history of southern Chinese ceramics. Starting from the Republican era, signs of decline began to emerge in Beiliu’s ceramics industry, yet it remained quite prosperous, with its products enjoying fame across Guangdong and Guangxi. According to the "Overview of Guangxi Counties" from the 22nd year of the Republic of China: “Beiliu exported about 15,000 pieces of porcelain and approximately 151,000 pieces of ceramics,” but due to the nation’s internal and external troubles, the ceramics industry could not escape the impact. Moreover, Beiliu’s operations had always been workshop-based, manually operated, using traditional techniques with product designs unchanged for thousands of years. From the start of the War of Resistance to the eve of liberation, Beiliu’s ceramics industry remained in a slump. Overall, Beiliu’s ceramics industry, through its historical ups and downs, stands uniquely in the forest of China’s ceramic development history with its distinctive regional culture. Though its ceramic-making history and peak came later than advanced regions like Yaozhou and Jingdezhen, it created the most splendid chapter in the history of southern and even Chinese ceramics, exerting a profound influence on the historical civilization of the south.