Porcelain

Description

A white, thin, translucent, ceramic fired at temperatures above 1260 C. Porcelain was first made in China as early as the T'ang dynasty (618-907 CE). It was eventually made in Europe in 1707 by Johann Bottger in Meissen, Germany. Porcelain is made from a fine-grain mixture of kaolin clay, quartz, and feldspar. At the high temperature, feldspar vitrifies to form the hard, dense, ceramic.

Synonyms and Related Terms

Porzellan (Deut.); porcelana (Esp.); porcelaine (Fr.); porselein(Ned.); porcelana (Port.)

Composition	4K2O - Al2O3 - 3SiO2
Mohs Hardness	6 - 7
Density	2.41

Authority

• G.S.Brady, G.S.Brady, Materials Handbook, McGraw-Hill Book Co., New York, 1971 Comment: p. 428

• Ralph Mayer, Ralph Mayer, A Dictionary of Art Terms and Techniques, Harper and Row Publishers, New York, 1969 (also 1945 printing)

• Dictionary of Building Preservation, Ward Bucher, ed., John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York City, 1996

• Robert Fournier, Robert Fournier, Illustrated Dictionary of Practical Pottery, Chilton Book Company, Radnor, PA, 1992

• Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, at http://www.wikipedia.com Comment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porcelain (Accessed Nov. 2, 2005)

• The American Heritage Dictionary or Encarta, via Microsoft Bookshelf 98, Microsoft Corp., 1998

• CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, Robert Weast (ed.), CRC Press, Boca Raton, Florida, v. 61, 1980 Comment: density=2.3-2.5