page_title: Johann Friedrich Böttger
section_title: Böttger ware
hierarchical_section_title: Johann Friedrich Böttger / Böttger ware
caption_attribution_description: English: Exhibit in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum - Nuremberg, Germany.
context_page_description: Johann Friedrich Böttger was a German alchemist. Böttger was born in Schleiz and died in Dresden. He is normally credited with being the first European to discover the secret of the creation of hard-paste porcelain in 1708, but it has also been claimed that English manufacturers or Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus produced porcelain first. Certainly, the Meissen factory, established 1710, was the first to produce porcelain in Europe in large quantities and since the recipe was kept a trade secret by Böttger for his company, experiments continued elsewhere throughout Europe.
context_section_description: In the late 17th century Chinese Yixing clay teapots, made of special Yixing clay, were imported to Europe along with China tea. They had long been popular in China, as the unglazed stoneware is said to improve the taste of tea. The unfamiliar  material inspired attempts to imitate it, and one Delftware manufacturer announced in 1678 that he was making "red teapots", of which no examples are known to survive. Some red stoneware by rival Dutch potters from about 1700 survives, closely copying Yixing pots in style (the Elers brothers made similar wares in England in the 1690s). Böttger was in contact with some of these and developed a rival "Böttger ware", a dark red stoneware first sold in 1710, and manufactured and imitated by others, all up to about 1740. It is a very significant stage in the development of porcelain in Europe.
caption: Meissen teapot, Böttger ware c. 1710
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "SONY", "Image Model": "DSC-RX100M3", "Image XResolution": "350", "Image YResolution": "350", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "DSC-RX100M3 v1.00", "Image DateTime": "2017:10:28 09:58:54", "Image Artist": "Picasa", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "296", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 51, 48, 48, 0, 0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "20948", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4811", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/80", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "320", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF RecommendedExposureIndex": "320", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2016:10:23 05:31:19", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2016:10:23 05:31:19", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "3", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "2411/640", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "95/32", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "239/10", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "5028", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3506", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "5472", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "3648", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "20800", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "65", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF ImageUniqueID": "d79cfdebb8a18dcfe37bb42c9e563da7", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[44/5, 257/10, 9/5, 14/5]"}