Chapter 33: Ding Kiln Carved-Flower Brush Washer
【Restoration Value: 7 points!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Modern porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Broken Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain, cannot be restored!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Song Dynasty Jun Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Modern porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Qing Dynasty Yongzheng porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
After Su Xiaofan repeatedly picked up each piece one by one, strings of information appeared in his mind like a waterfall, and the information contained in the broken porcelain itself was dazzling for a while.
These broken porcelain pieces came from almost every dynasty. Surprisingly, modern broken porcelain was actually the least common, while Song Dynasty porcelain fragments were the most numerous, with one or two pieces from the Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong periods of the Qing Dynasty occasionally appearing.
When Su Xiaofan had set up a stall at the Luochuan antique market, he had also gotten to know a stall owner who sold broken porcelain.
In the early years, some kiln sites were excavated, and there were tens of thousands of broken porcelain pieces. Most of the broken porcelain was really cheap, basically sold by the sackful and weighed by the jin. Even if they were sold at a few yuan per piece at a street stall, that was still a profit.
Modern porcelain fragments, on the other hand, were rare, because modern porcelain was used in people's homes. Once it broke, it was simply thrown into the trash, and no one went out of their way to collect it.
Therefore, relatively speaking, the items with the fewest fakes in the antique market were ancient broken porcelain pieces and copper coins. These two kinds of objects simply could not fetch much money, and the cost of making imitations was probably higher than their market price, so it was not worth it at all.
“This won't work either. There are so many broken porcelain pieces. If I want all of them, there's no way I can assemble a complete piece.”
Looking at the information in his mind, Su Xiaofan scratched his head. After thinking for a moment, Su Xiaofan decided to specifically pick out the broken Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain.
Because among all the porcelain fragments Su Xiaofan had examined, Ding Kiln porcelain fragments were the most numerous. Ding Kiln was originally in the northern province, very close to Yanjing, so perhaps the stall owner's ancestors really had gone there to collect them.
During the 1980s and 1990s, many kiln sites were unearthed during urban construction, and the number of excavated porcelain fragments was beyond counting. A large portion was destroyed, while a small portion entered private hands, ending up on street stalls like these today.
Once he had made up his mind, Su Xiaofan specifically picked out porcelain pieces with roughly similar colors and luster, because only pieces with the same color could possibly be assembled into a complete object. Plain-colored pieces were much easier to piece together than blue-and-white ones and the like.
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Song Dynasty Ge Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragment, cannot be restored!】
One broken porcelain piece after another was tossed by Su Xiaofan into the basket. After picking through them for a while, Su Xiaofan discovered that the Ding Kiln white porcelain was the most abundant at this stall, so he picked out the broken porcelain of other colors as well, leaving only the white porcelain.
The information in Su Xiaofan's mind flashed extremely quickly. In just over twenty minutes, he had actually picked out more than half a basket of porcelain fragments, all of them Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragments.
After thinking for a moment, Su Xiaofan stopped. He did not pick up individual porcelain fragments, but instead shifted his attention to the entire basket.
【Restoration Value: 7 points!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln Carved-Flower Brush Washer: Incomplete, restorable, requires 1 Restoration Value point to restore, restore?】
To Su Xiaofan's immense delight, his guess had indeed been correct. Among these Song Dynasty Ding Kiln porcelain fragments, there really was a complete set of porcelain fragments, and the Restoration Value in his mind could restore it.
“Don't restore it!”
Su Xiaofan replied in his mind. The item had not even reached his hands yet, so of course he could not restore it now.
“Holy crap, you picked this many?”
Glancing into the basket, Su Xiaofan could not help being startled. He had not noticed it for a while, but there were probably two or three hundred broken porcelain pieces in the basket. At thirty-one yuan each, that would cost six or seven thousand yuan.
Seeing that the stall owner was still engrossed in reading his novel, Su Xiaofan began another sneaky maneuver. Each time, he took out a handful of porcelain pieces and put them aside, then checked the information on the basket of porcelain fragments again.
If the information showed that they could not be restored, that meant he had selected the porcelain fragments belonging to a restorable piece, and Su Xiaofan would then identify them one by one.
Several hundred broken porcelain pieces looked like a lot, but they were actually quick to sort through. In less than half an hour, only a little over thirty porcelain fragments remained in Su Xiaofan's basket, more than twenty of which he had deliberately put in just to make up the numbers.
“My luck really is pretty good. I can actually piece together a complete piece of porcelain even like this.”
Looking at those porcelain fragments, Su Xiaofan also found it somewhat unbelievable. There were several thousand broken porcelain pieces here, while that Song Dynasty Ding Kiln carved-flower brush washer had actually only broken into seven pieces.
What Su Xiaofan did not know was that what seemed like good luck was actually the result of the selection performed by the restoration system in his mind. Finding a complete piece of porcelain was inevitable.
Because broken porcelain with collectible value was usually preserved intact when it was broken.
Just like some broken porcelain excavated from kiln sites, although it was swept into piles with brooms and then packed into sacks for sale, the pieces were all fragments of complete porcelain objects, with very little actually missing. It was simply that later generations could no longer restore and piece them back together.
“Boss, I've finished picking. Give me a price.”
Su Xiaofan called out to the stall owner and handed over the small basket.
“Oh, you took quite a while to pick. I've already finished several chapters. Damn that Da Yan guy, in Golden Eyes he spent more than ten chapters on a single gambling-on-stones plot……”
The stall owner put down his phone, took the basket Su Xiaofan handed him, glanced inside, and said, “Brother, you've really got a good eye. There's even a piece of Chai Kiln broken porcelain in here.”
“Come on, big brother, don't even think about trying to raise the price. If you really had a fragment of Chai Kiln porcelain, would you still be setting up a stall here?”
Su Xiaofan laughed as soon as he heard that.
Chai Kiln was fired in the early years of the Xiande era of the Later Zhou during the Five Dynasties. Because Emperor Shizong's surname was Chai at the time, it was also called the Imperial Kiln, and beginning in the Song Dynasty it came to be called Chai Kiln.
Chai Kiln porcelain was said to be blue like the sky, bright like a mirror, thin like paper, and resonant like a chime, moist and delicate with fine lines, exquisitely made and unusually colored. It had always been regarded as the foremost among all kilns,
Chai Kiln could be said to be the most mysterious kiln site in the history of China. Extremely few pieces had been passed down, and even today there was still enormous controversy over whether any Chai Kiln porcelain actually existed. That saying about a single piece of broken porcelain being worth a thousand pieces of gold was actually referring specifically to Chai Kiln porcelain.
The stall owner saying there was Chai Kiln porcelain in the basket was obviously an attempt to raise the price. This was also a classic bargaining tactic unique to the antique market.
“We agreed on the price, thirty-one yuan per piece. If you want to sell, I'll pay. If you don't, I'll turn around and leave. I won't interfere with your business. How about it?”
Su Xiaofan did not waste words with the stall owner. They said people from Yanjing were especially good at talking, and he figured his own gift of the gab was probably no match for the other man's.
“All right, I can see you're a straightforward guy, so we'll do it your way.”
The stall owner knew he could not gain much of an advantage from Su Xiaofan, so he immediately counted the porcelain fragments in the basket.
“Thirty-two pieces in total. I'll charge you one thousand yuan……” The stall owner tapped away on a calculator and placed it in front of Su Xiaofan.
“Brother, was your math teacher a PE teacher or a music teacher?”
Su Xiaofan looked speechlessly at the smiling, seemingly honest boss and said, “My math was taught by my English teacher. Thirty-two pieces, thirty yuan each, should be nine hundred yuan, right?”
“Ahem, nine hundred and fifty, nine hundred and fifty yuan. I'll give you ten yuan off, okay?”
People in business were never thin-skinned. Even after Su Xiaofan exposed him, the other man was not embarrassed. He took out a payment QR code and gestured for Su Xiaofan to scan it.
Su Xiaofan had seen this kind of thing many times, so naturally he did not get angry. After scanning and paying, he had the boss find a bag and put the thirty-some porcelain pieces inside.
“Hey, brother, you're giving me this brush washer too, right?”
Before leaving, Su Xiaofan pointed at a very inconspicuous white porcelain brush washer and said.
Su Xiaofan had just checked it with his Restoration Value. It was merely a modern handicraft, but judging from its material, this handicraft was very similar to the porcelain fragments Su Xiaofan had selected.
“Sure, brother, you're straightforward, and I'm not stingy either. Take it.” The stall owner nodded and put the brush washer into Su Xiaofan's bag.
“Brother, come again next time.”
Having made the sale, the stall owner was also all smiles. The cost of several dozen broken porcelain pieces was probably less than fifty yuan, so everyone was satisfied.
“Okay, see you next time.”
The smile on Su Xiaofan's face was even brighter than the stall owner's, and he even threw in a bit of Beijing slang he had just learned.
Blending into the bustling crowd, Su Xiaofan was in an exceptionally good mood. Today, he had unlocked another function of the restoration system: as long as the fragments of a broken object were complete, the object could also be restored.
“Should I restore this piece of porcelain first, or buy another one?”
Su Xiaofan's eyes were looking at the stalls, but his thoughts were already on the bag in his hand. He still remembered his competition with Zhao Zhengshan, and was now wondering whether to use the restored Ding Kiln porcelain for the contest or look for another object.
With just one Restoration Value point, he could restore a complete piece of Ding Kiln porcelain. Su Xiaofan was now itching with anticipation, like a cat scratching at his heart, and had no mind to continue treasure hunting.
“Restore it first, then decide after seeing the result!” Su Xiaofan made up his mind.
Looking left and right, Su Xiaofan walked toward a small alley.
The alleys on both sides of this antique street were all residential areas, with all sorts of things piled up here and there. Su Xiaofan stood beside a trash can and lit a cigarette. He had smoked half of it without seeing anyone come out of the alley.
Su Xiaofan put his hand into the bag and gathered the seven fragments together.
【Restoration Value: 7 points!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln Carved-Flower Brush Washer: Incomplete, restorable, requires 1 Restoration Value point to restore, restore?】
“Restore!” Su Xiaofan said silently in his heart.
【Restoration Value: 6 points!】
【Song Dynasty Ding Kiln Carved-Flower Brush Washer, cannot be restored!】
Seeing the information appear in his mind, Su Xiaofan immediately felt that the hand that had originally been holding several porcelain pieces suddenly held a smooth, complete porcelain object.
Not daring to take it out directly, Su Xiaofan lifted the bag a little higher. At a glance, a small brush washer, white with a slight bluish tint and a little larger than an oil dish, appeared before his eyes.
A brush washer was a type of scholar's studio item used for holding water to wash brushes, in addition to the Four Treasures of the Study: brush, ink, paper, and inkstone.
Brush washers came in many styles. The one Su Xiaofan had restored was a shallow-mouthed carved-flower brush washer, belonging to the most famous category of Ding Kiln white porcelain, and it looked extremely exquisite.
What made Su Xiaofan happiest was that after being restored, this brush washer still retained the glaze patina of ancient porcelain.
Even some of the dirt originally attached to the porcelain fragments was still clinging to the porcelain, making it look just like an inconspicuous little dish.
If not for the answer provided by the Restoration Value in his mind, Su Xiaofan would not have dared to believe that this object, which looked like a small oil dish, was actually a Song Dynasty Ding Kiln carved-flower brush washer.
“It's not too far off. It should be enough to fool them.”
Su Xiaofan took out the handicraft porcelain that had been given to him for free from the bag and casually threw it into the trash can beside him.
(End of Chapter)
Comments
Post a Comment