Bowl with black and white glaze Front

At some point during the Kaiyuan or Tianbao era of the Tang dynasty (from 713 CE to 756 CE), the character for tea appeared in Chinese. Tea was dried and formed into round cakes at this time. Many words related to tea and utensils specifically used to make tea gradually appeared in historical records. In the capital, artistic tea-drinking was held in high regard. Monks, literati, and scholar-officials were inventive in their use of elegant utensils, resulting in the development of eye-catching vessels to drink tea. These vessels were glazed with a black glaze on the outside and a white glaze on the inside.