Suen-tih, whose reign is the most celebrated for the production of Ming porcelain, produced very fine examples, with flowers in pale blue, having red fish moulded as handles. Then comes the fine colour paintings of Ching-hwa, through which we reach the perfection of the Kang-he in the Tsing dynasty. It is remarkable that only a few Ming specimens seem to have been identified with enamel colour decoration, though in recent, indeed, quite late times, authorities are ascribing many pieces with green and yellow enamel set in black outline to Ming, rather than to Kang-he. White, green, and crackle pieces are often mentioned in the historical records.
We read that Lord Treasurer Burleigh, William Cecil, Secretary of State for nearly forty years to Queen Elizabeth, offered as a New Year's gift, in 1588, to his royal mistress "one porringer of white porselyn garnished with gold," and another gift of a similar kind was made to the Queen by Mr. Robert Cecil, "a cup of grene pursselyne." Later, we read that amongst the effects of Lady Dorothy Shirley were "purslin stuffe, Chinese stuffe, two dozen of purslin dishes."
It will be noted that it was only with the advent of Shakespeare and the Authorised Version of the Bible that our English spelling took anything like uniformity. The last note regarding Lady Shirley's possessions was made in 1620. In the time which had elapsed between these records much had occurred in the Orient. The Dutch, in 1595, sent out their first expedition to the East Indies, and Queen Elizabeth, not to be outdone, despatched three English ships to China in 1596. Three years later the East India Company was founded, a company which at first could not trade in India or China owing to the fierce opposition of the Portuguese and Dutch. They therefore made their headquarters at Gombron in the Persian Gulf. The china ware was brought overland or by coasting vessels to Gombron, which gave the early name "Gombron ware" to porcelain which was universally used before the adoption of the name "china."
During the Ming dynasty the practice of placing marks upon the porcelain was first adopted, though the rule seems to have been to mark only one piece in a set, yet the method of marking porcelain was far from being universal or methodical. In acquiring Ming porcelain the buyer must be especially careful. For many centuries the old forms were copied, and in counterfeiting the porcelain and decoration it was quite easy to imitate the mark. Here, then, we must once more advise the collector to rely upon sight and touch. We have stated that it is the inspiration of the educated eye regarding the _tout ensemble_ which was largely to be trusted. On the other hand it would not be well to dispense with the necessity for actually handling the piece with the view to detecting differences between the old and the new work. In dealing with fine pieces there is one advantage: they are submitted to expert after expert, whose opinions may vary, but truth is great and will prevail.