44 Field Museum of Natural History- 1 — Anth., Vol. XII. 



book, should have failed to recognize the Chinese character of pieces 

 brought from Luzon over to Japan? If he does not allude to any 

 Chinese relationship, but classifies this ware as a distinct group of 

 Luzons, — what is, or could then be, the specific character of these pro- 

 ductions to differentiate them from Chinese or any other? One point 

 is obvious at the outset, — that this Luzon ware cannot be due to any 

 native tribes of the Philippines. The descriptions refer to highly 

 glazed pieces of an advanced workmanship, such as have never been 

 turned out by the aborigines, whose primitive unglazed or polished 

 earthenware could hardly have tempted the Japanese, not to speak of 

 having elicited their admiration, as we read on the preceding pages. 

 In order to understand, on the part of the Japanese, the assumption of 

 an individual, artistic Philippine pottery coveted by them and deemed 

 worthy of imitation, we have three possibilities to take into considera- 

 tion: the trade of Siam and Cambodja with the Islands by which 

 pottery of these countries has doubtless reached them, particularly 

 the celadon made in Siam; a special manufacture of pottery in China 

 for the needs of the Philippine market; and possibly, to a certain extent, 

 a home production on the Islands through Chinese or Japanese settlers 

 (or both) } By availing themselves of local clays and glazing materials, 

 these may have accomplished a ware of fairly peculiar qualities and yet 

 not much removed from what they had learned in the lands of their 

 birth. Such an hypothesis would indeed meet the requirements of the 

 situation advantageously and satisfactorily. The only objection to 

 be made to it, — and it is certainly a strong one, — is that no record of 

 any Sino-Japanese pottery-making on the Islands exists, either in 

 Spanish accounts, or in native traditions, or in Chinese and Japanese 

 literature. On the other hand, no valid reason could be advanced 

 against the possibility of its existence, and in the same manner as the 

 ruins of the celadon kilns of Siam, for a long time disowned, have finally 

 been discovered, we may expectantly look forward to a future similar 



1 In the Seiyd-ki-bun, an old Japanese manuscript by Arm Hakuseki, trans- 

 lated by S. R. Brown (Journal North China Branch Royal Asiatic Society, N. S., 

 Vols. II and III, Shanghai, 1865 and 66), there is the following passage relative to 

 the Japanese settlement on Luzon (Vol. II, p. 80) : "In the southwest part of Luzon, 

 there is a mountain which produces a large amount of silver. More than three 

 thousand descendants of Japanese emigrants live there together and do not depart 

 from the customs of their fatherland. When their officers make their appearance 

 abroad, they wear two swords and are accompanied by spear-bearers. The rest of 

 these Japanese wear one sword. The Spaniards have laws for the government of 

 this colony of Japanese, and do not let them wander about in the country indis- 

 criminately. Four years ago twelve Japanese who had been driven off from our 

 coast by a storm, arrived at Rusun [Luzon], and the Spaniards assigned them a 

 place with the rest of their countrymen." The political platform of these Japanese 

 colonizers, who seem to have been settled before i^g8,was an entente cordiale with the 

 Spaniards and hostile attitude toward the Chinese, in their own interest (see Rela- 

 tions of the Chinese, etc., p. 269). 



