bone china

bone china, variety of porcelain developed by English potters in the last half of the 18th and early 19th cent. The clay is tempered with phosphate of lime or bone ash. This innovation greatly increased the strength of the porcelain during and after firing.

Bibliography

See B. and T. Hughes, English Porcelain and Bone China, 1743–1850 (1955); H. Peter and N. Schiffer, China for America: Export Porcelain of the 18th and 19th Century (1979).

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bone china

Wedgwood bone china plate, Staffordshire, 1815–20; in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

(credit: Courtesy of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; photograph, EB Inc.)

Hard-paste porcelain containing bone ash. It was developed by Josiah Spode (1754–1827) in England c. 1800. The addition of bone ash to china stone and china clay (i.e., hard china) made bone china easier to manufacture; it is stronger, does not chip easily, and has an ivory-white colour that lends itself to decoration. Other factories (Minton, Derby, Worcester, Wedgwood, Rockingham) adopted the formula in the early 19th century. Bone china remains popular for tableware in Britain and the U.S. See also stoneware.