Things You Must Know About Hares Fur Jianzhan Tea Cup

1. What is a hare's fur cup

The glaze color is an indispensable soul for the Jianzhan Tenmuku cup. The hare’s fur bowl is a black glazed porcelain with a glazed surface resembling rabbit hair fired in a kiln. The hare’s fur cup was very famous in the Song Dynasty.

Emperor Huizong said in his “Da Guan Cha Lun”: “The color of the Jianzhan cup is precious in green and black, and the orderly arrangement of stripes is rare.”. The hare’s fur-shaped brownish-yellow stripes on the glazed surface of the cup are fish scale-like structures under a microscope, with coarse black stripes formed by hematite crystals on both sides.

2. Characteristics

The morphology of a hare’s fur patterns includes length, thickness, curvature, and straightness, with colors such as gold, silver, and brown. The distribution varies in density and coverage.

Hare’s fur cup is one of the main products used in Jian kilns, characterized by yellow-red flowing patterns on the black glaze or black flowing threads on the yellow-brown glaze. Just like rabbit hair suspended on the glaze, the rabbit hair is clear and very textured.

3. How it comes into being

Because the iron content in the glaze is as high as 9%, some of the iron dissolves into the glaze during high-temperature firing in the kiln. The bubbles in the glaze bring the iron to the glaze surface. When fired to 1300 ℃, the iron forms stripes, and when cooled, rows of small hematite crystals precipitate, forming a brilliant rabbit hair glaze.

4. Purpose

The hare’s fur cup was a famous Diancha utensil in the Song Dynasty. During the Song Dynasty, there was a tea fighting custom in the court and among the people, so this type of tea cup with a thick body and dark glaze was very popular then. High quality for royal use. The bottom of the imperial hare’s fur cups is generally engraved with inscriptions such as “Yu Gong.”

5. Status

The hare’s fur is the most popular variety of Jianzhan, and archaeological discoveries, passed-down objects, and historical documents can prove its status. During the Song Dynasty, poetry related to tea drinking often praised and sang about the hare’s fur cup.

Many tea books also honored the hare’s fur cup as the teacup. The “Tea Set Illustrated” even directly painted one of the twelve tea sets as the rabbit hair cup, and its position is beyond doubt.