Bizen ware tea bowl

A Bizen ware tea bowl (chawan), with reddish markings from the kiln firing. Signed with impressed seal on the bottom. Perfect condition.

 

The chawan is used for preparing and drinking tea. First imported from China to Japan in the 13th century up to the 16th century, when the Japanse started producing tea bowls themselves.

 

Bizen ware  (備前焼 Bizen-yaki?), also called Imbe ware after the village of Imbe in  Okayama prefecture, is a type of Japanese stoneware most identifiable by its iron-like hardness, reddish brown color, absence of glaze (though there can be traces of molten ash looking like glaze), and markings resulting from wood-burning  kiln  firing.  It is Japan's oldest pottery-making technique, introduced in the  Heian period
(794–1185). Bizen is one of the six remaining kilns of medieval Japan.