Porcelain Glossary and Time Guides:

AG: abbreviation for Aktiengesellschaft, a German company.

Aluminite: high-fired French porcelain developed in 1900 for oven-to-table cookware.

Basalt: A dense uniform black stoneware developed and made by Wedgwood.

Blue & White: A term denoting cobalt coloring under the glaze.

Bone China: Standard English porcelain since 1800. Containing bone ash, which kept porcelain from warping or collapsing when fired. The words "bone china" do not appear as part of a mark until about 1915.

Brevete: used as early as 1820, is means patented in French.

Celadon: Chinese, Korean and other Asian stoneware with a bluish-green color derived from feldspathic glaze on a slip containing iron.

Ceramics: Describes any object of clay that has been hardened by fire.

Crackling: A decorative effect of fine cracks in glazed ware used by the Chinese and sometimes imitated in 19th c. England.

Crazing: A network of thin irregular criss-crossing lines resembling fine cracks. This may be confined to the glaze, or may go beneath causing discoloration.

Creamware: A faintly yellow earthenware with transparent lead glaze.

Decore a la main: French for "hand-decorated."

Depose: French for "registered", circa 1900.

Faience: French version of tin-glazed earthenware.

Firenze: Italian for Florence

Flammefest: Flame Resistant (German)

Flintporslin: Swedish Creamware

Flow Blue: A technique used to decorate hard, white bodied earthenware from roughly 1835 to the first quarter of the 20th c. The decorations were underglaze blue patterns (most often transfer printed but also applied by hand by brush stroke), the ink of which was caused to bleed or "flow" into the undecorated portions of earthenware vessels during the glaze firing. The desired "flow" was produced when lime or chloride of ammonia was added into the protective shell of the fire-clay sagger surrounding the wares during the glaze firing.

Fraggonard: couple (as in romantic depictions)

Gesetzlich Geschutzt (Ges. Gesch.): used after 1899; German for legally patented or registered.

Grand Feu: Name for a ceramic fired at a high temperature (French); there is also a California pottery by that name.

Hard Paste Porcelain: Based on stone, it is a compound of infusible and fusible clay, fired at high temperature.

Made In: used 1887 and after; required by English law, along with country name.

Made in Occupied Japan: Circa 1945-1952, used on all Japanese exported goods during this period.

Majolica: Technically, "maiolica" is any pottery glazed with an opaque tin enamel that conceals the color of the clay body. "Majolica" with a "j" was used in the 1860's in England for relief decorated pottery covered with colored glazes.

Mocha Ware: Utilitarian earthenware, chiefly mugs, decorated with colored bands into which tree, moss or fern-like effects were made.

Nippon: Is the Japanese name for Japan; used 1891-1921 as a country name, sometimes after 1891 as part of a company name.

Parian: A special kind of porcelain bisque dating from about 1845, which was used chiefly for statuary.

Pate-sur-pate: A style of decoration produced by successive coats of porcelain slip applied to a tied Parian body and then carved to create a cameo-like design.

Pearlware: White earthenware containing more flint and white clay than creamware.

Porcelain: Ceramic made of kaolin and petuntse and fired at high temperatures. Distinguished from earthenware by its impermeability and from this and stoneware by its translucency.

Porringer: A low bowl with straight sides for feeding baby; Allows food to cool quickly and doesn’t tip.

Queensware: A superiortype of creamware developed by Josiah Wedgwood for Queen Charlotte.

Royal: Used as part of many English marks after 1850.

Salt Glaze: A hard translucent non-porous glaze on stoneware. Salt was thrown into the kiln at the moment of peak temperature, depositing a fine coating of soda and alumina on the surface of the ware giving it a thin, intensely hard film of transparent soda glass. It is characterized by tiny pin holes or granules giving it a rough surface.

Semi-vitreous (s-v): used after 1901 on a type of heavy ceramic popular for dinnerware.

Slip: Liquid clay, used in the making of pottery, and also as applied decoration.

Soft-Paste Porcelain: Based on Glass, for transparency. It can be marked easily with a file and when broken, the body appears granular. Must be first fired in unglazed state and then re-fired at lower temperature after glazing. Especially good as base for enameling.

Spatterware/Spongeware: Inexpensive English pottery made for the American market in the first half of the 19th c. with simple, brightly painted designs that were ‘spattered’ or sponged on.

Trademark: Used on English pieces after the Tremark Act of 1862; and on US pieces after 1875.

Transferware: English method of decoration where the design is minutely engraved in reverse on a copper plate, taken off in enamel pigment on paper, transferred to the surface of the porcelain and then fired.

22 Carat: Indicates trim is real 22K gold; used after 1930s.

Underglaze: Design or Mark is applied under the glaze.

US Zone: Pertains to the U.S.-occupied section of Germany after WWII, circa 1945-1949.

West Germany: Used in makers marks 1949-1990.

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Sources: "Ceramics, But What Is It?" by Louise C. Eaton; "Kovel’s New Dictionary of Marks," and "Know Your Antiques," by Ralph & Terry Kovel; "Fascinating Flow Blue" by Jeffrey B. Snyder.