Foliate Tray with Sword Pommel Design

The carved lacquer techniques that emerged in China during the Tang dynasty and were developed enormously in the Song dynasty involved coating a vessel with several dozen layers of lacquer to create a hard surface and then carving into this with a sharp tool to create the design. The Japanese call pieces like this one with a black upper surface tsuikoku; in China, they are known as tihei. Other variations include red-carved lacquerware (J. tsuishu), yellow-carved ware (J. tsuiō), and “red-flowers, green-leaves” (kōka ryokuyō), a technique in which green and red layers of lacquer are overlaid and the colors revealed by varying the depth of carving.
One can make out seven layers of red lacquer in between layers of black on this tray. To have these colors sharply delineated required the technical ability to apply very thin lacquer coatings absolutely evenly, the time to leave each layer long enough to harden completely, and the highly advanced carving skills to maintain exactly the right angle when carving out the design.
A great deal of Chinese carved lacquerware was imported during the Kamakura and Muromachi periods, when Chinese artifacts became extremely popular in Japan. Some were used as ritual implements in Zen temples, while others were highly prized to decorate shoin-style residences. The latter included formal tea utensils like foliate trays, round trays, incense containers, scroll trays, and teabowl stands. These are preserved and cherished to this day.
The bracken spiral pattern is often found on carved lacquerware as well as on Kamakura-bori, which imitates Chinese carved lacquer by lacquering wood already carved with a pattern; its Japanese name, gurimon (spiral pattern), derives from kurikuri meaning to spin round. Unusual in its having nine lobes, this foliate plate has very finely carved small bracken spirals laid out in perfectly regular concentric circles. We can only wonder how the artist calculated the arrangement with such precision.