142 Beginnings of Porcelain 



life of the people. Certainly, the term liu-li refers also to opaque 

 glass, especially from the fifth century onward. If in 519, under the 

 Emperor Wu of the Liang dynasty (502-520), Khotan sent to China 

 a tribute gift of liu-li pitchers {liu-li ying H), 1 these may be con- 

 ceived of as glass as well as of glazed pottery. In other passages the 

 exact significance of the term remains doubtful, as in the case of a 

 saddle of brilliant white liu-li, which in the dark emitted light at the 

 distance of a hundred feet, and which is mentioned in the Si king tsa ki 

 M^Hlfi 2 among presents sent to the Emperor Wu from India. Here 

 we have a fabulous echo of traditions that were exaggerated by later 

 generations. 



It is a significant fact that the reign of the same Emperor Wu is 

 characterized by the sudden rise of alchemy and chemical notions and 

 experiments; 3 and this novel line of thought is certainly connected with 

 the western expansion and the newly-opened trade-routes across 

 Central Asia inaugurated by the same sovereign. In the Greek alchemi- 

 cal papyri we meet the oldest technical recipes for the fabrication of 

 glass and enamels, and technical treatises on glass. 4 Aeneas of Gaza, 

 a Neo-Platonic philosopher of the fifth century, represents glass directly 

 as an alchemical transmutation from a baser to a nobler material by 

 observing, "There is nothing incredible about the metamorphosis of 

 matter into a superior state. In this manner those versed in the art 

 of matter take silver and tin, change their appearance, and transmute 

 them into excellent gold. Glass is manufactured from divisible sand 

 and dissoluble natron, and thus becomes a novel and brilliant thing." 5 

 We have a few intimations to the effect that liu-li was appreciated also 

 by the Chinese alchemists. Tung-fang So obtained multi-colored 

 dew and placed it in glazed vessels, which he offered as a gift to the 

 Emperor Wu. 6 The famous alchemist Li Shao-kun ^ 'P %*, whose 

 life and deeds have been narrated by Se-ma Ts'ien, is said to have 

 repaired the brilliant-white liu-li saddle of Wu mentioned afore, when 

 this saddle was once broken during an imperial hunting-expedition; 

 he availed himself of pieces of bone, which were joined by means of a 

 thin, sticky substance, with such good effects, that no damage could be 



1 Liang shu, Ch. 54, p. 14 b. 



* Ch. 2, p. 2 b (ed. of Han Wei ts'ung shu). 



* See particularly Chavannes, Memoires historiques de Se-ma Ts'ien, Vol. Ill- 

 p. 465. 



* M. Berthelot, Introduction a l'6tude de la chimie des anciens et du moyen 

 age, pp. 200, 202; Les Origines de l'alchimie, pp. 123, 125. 



6 M. Berthelot, Origines, p. 75. 

 6 T'ai p'ing yu Ian, Ch. 808, p. 4 b. 



