ink-cake BM-1909-0611.5

Period:Ming dynasty Production date:1368-1644
Materials:iron sulphate (possibly)
Technique:moulded
Subjects:child
Dimensions:Diameter: 12.70 centimetres

Description:
Round ink-cake. Boys playing (design of the “One hundred sons”) both on the front and on the reverse.
IMG


Comments:Rawson 1992:The ink used by the calligrapher and the colour pigments used by the painter were water based and prepared in sticks or cakes. The earliest examples of ink are found in traces of writing dating to the fourteenth century BC. Ink was principally made from carbon obtained from burning resinous pinewood, to which lampblack made from animal, vegetable or mineral oils was added. This was mixed with glue, moulded into a cake and dried. The colours were made from a variety of vegetable or mineral pigments: blue from indigo or mineral azurite, green from malachite, white from lead and red from cinnabar and iron-oxide. The cakes of ink and coloured pigments were ground by hand on an inkstone and mixed with water to produce the solution of the desired density.The manufacture of ink cakes in decorative forms began as early as the Tang and became a minor art form for the collector. In the late Ming two manufacturers, Cheng Dayue (1541-1616?) and Fang Yulu (1570-1619) from Shexian in the prefecture of Huizhou in Anhui province, were famous for their ink cakes, the designs of which they printed in colour in two woodblock-printed compendia, the ‘Fangshi mopu’ (1588) and the ‘Chengshi moyuan’ (1606). See also BM 1938.0524.670 and BM 1938.0524.762; both by Cheng Dayue. British and Medieval Register; B&M Extracts, 1903-1921, p.116: ‘Japanese objects, given, with a piece of Chinese porcelain, by Edward Dillon, Esq. [address – confidential]. 5. Ink-cake, circular, with raised design on both faces, representing verandah, terraces, boat, and many figures in groups. Diameter 5 ins.’