pottery

Introduction
Kinds, processes, and techniques
- Kinds of pottery
  - Earthenware
  - Stoneware
  - Porcelain
- Forming processes and techniques
  - Shaping the clay
  - Drying, turning, and firing
- Decorating processes and techniques
  - Impressing and stamping
  - Incising, sgraffito, carving, and piercing
  - Slip decorating
  - Burnishing and polishing
  - Decorative glazing
  - Painting
  - Transfer printing
- Marking
Western pottery
- Ancient Near East and Egypt
- Ancient Aegean and Greece
  - Bronze Age
    - Early Bronze Age (c. 3000–2000 bce)
    - Middle Bronze Age (c. 2000–1500 bce)
    - Late Bronze Age (c. 1580–1100 bce)
  - Early Iron Age
    - Geometric style
    - Period of Oriental influence (c. 725–c. 600 bce)
  - Attic black-figure and red-figure
    - Archaic period (c. 750–c. 480 bce)
    - Classical period (c. 480–c. 330 bce)
    - Hellenistic period (c. 330–c. 30 bce)
- Etruscan and Roman
  - Etruria
  - Roman Empire
- Islamic
  - Early Islamic
    - Umayyad
    - ʾAbbāsid
    - Sāmānid
  - Egyptian
  - Mesopotamia and Persia
    - 11th to 15th century
    - Later Persian
  - Syrian
  - Turkish
- European: to the end of the 18th century
  - Byzantium
  - Spain
    - Lustreware
    - Other tin-glazed ware
    - Porcelain
  - Italy
    - Majolica
    - Sgraffito wares
    - Porcelain
  - France and Belgium
    - Lead-glazed wares of the 16th century
    - Faience, or tin-glazed ware
    - Porcelain
  - Germany and Austria
    - Stoneware
    - Tin-glazed ware
    - Porcelain
  - The Netherlands
  - Britain
    - Tin-glazed ware
    - 17th-century slipware
    - Stoneware
    - 18th-century developments
    - Porcelain
  - Scandinavia
  - Switzerland and Russia
  - Colonial America
- 19th century
  - Britain
    - Porcelain
    - Stoneware and earthenware
  - The European continent
  - The United States
- 20th century
  - Pottery factories
  - The artist-potter
East Asian and Southeast Asian pottery
- China
  - Tang dynasty (618–907 ce)
  - Song dynasty (960–1279 ce)
  - Yuan dynasty (1206–1368)
  - Ming dynasty (1368–1644)
    - Reign of the Xuande emperor (1425–35)
    - Reign of the Chenghua emperor (1464–87)
    - Reigns of the Hongzhi and Zhengde emperors (1487–1521)
    - Reign of the Jiajing emperor (1521–1566/67)
    - Reigns of the Longqing and Wanli emperors (1567–1620)
    - Provincial and export wares
  - Qing dynasty (1644–1911/12)
    - Underglaze blue and red
    - Coloured glazes
    - Overglaze colours
    - European influence and the export trade
    - 19th and 20th centuries
- Korea
- Japan
  - Kamakura and Muromachi periods (1192–1573)
  - Azuchi-Momoyama period (1573–1600)
  - Edo period (1603–1867)
  - 19th and 20th centuries
- Thailand and Annam
American Indian pottery
- North America
- Central America
- South America

References & Edit History Related Topics

Images & Videos

Hohokam pottery

Yixing ware teapot

unfired whiteware

Pottery from the Jōmon period

Cizhou stoneware vase

Minoan spouted jar

Detail from the Brygos Cup by the Brygos Painter, showing ancient Greek warriors in battle during the Sack of Troy, with figures in armor and shields on a black and red pottery surface.

At a Glance

famille rose porcelain vase

pottery summary

Hohokam pottery — Hohokam pottery Pottery created by the Hohokam people, made of buff clay and painted with red designs.

pottery

decorative art

Written by

George Savage

Fact-checked by

Britannica Editors

Last updated

Oct. 26, 2026 •History

pottery, one of the oldest and most widespread of the decorative arts, consisting of objects made of clay and hardened with heat. The objects made are commonly useful ones, such as vessels for holding liquids or plates or bowls from which food can be served. Clay, the basic material of pottery, has two distinctive characteristics: it is plastic (i.e., it can be molded and will retain the shape imposed upon it); and it hardens on...

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