Various objects are needed to conduct a tea ceremony with decorum. Most important among them are ceramics: bowls for sipping the tea from, vessels for holding and pouring water, side dishes for passing carefully prepared and visually appealing sweets and cakes, caddies for holding powdered
tea, covered boxes for incense, vases for flower arrangements, and candle-holders and other paraphernalia for decoration and atmosphere. The collection illustrated and described in this book was assembled over a decade by Honda and Shimazu. It is impeccable in taste and will appeal not only to the
Asian collector of ceramics because of its strong aesthetic value but also to the Western collector curious about Japanese preferences: a calm and functional beauty, technical perfection, and historical identification. The book, originally published in Japanese, is arranged in three parts. The
first part is comprised of ceramics made in Vietnam from pre-Christian days until the sixteenth century; the second and third part covers Chinese porcelain and stoneware of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.