Server or pourer, Koishiwara region, Japan

Tokkuri by Tetsuro Oota, Koishiwara, Fukuoka Prefecture, Kyusha, Japan

How do you know who made it, Naomi, as I can't see any mark?

Personally, I do not think it is a tokkuri, as sake bottles are not traditionally this shape and do not have a spout. Probably a soy bottle or something similar would be my guess.

I asked on a Japanese group and they found a very similar one on a Japanese online sales site.
There was some discussion over its use. 11.5cm high x 11cm diameter - probably too big for a soy sauce pot, so the alternatives were a tokkuri, yazumashi (hot water cooler), or noodle dipping server.

It's my view that without any mark or any provenance that it is not appropriate to suggest a maker or to a certain extent suggest an area of production unless an item is typical let alone state that a person made a specific item.


Until I saw this, I had not heard of Koishiwara yaki. I haven't been able to find an image of the clay body to see if the foot of this vessel is typical but I have seen a suggestion that pots from this region are typically decorated with brushwork and/or chatter marks, which this vessel does not have. That does not mean that the suggestion of the "Japanese group" is not correct but I have not been able to find any evidence to corroborate it. Therefore I would not be happy to go as far as suggest that it is where this vessel originates.

Hopefully the link works. It’s all in Japanese which is why you would not find it on a google search. It was translated for me so I cannot vouch for the Westernised spelling of the name which they gave me.


https://www.moyais.com/smartphone/detail.html?id=000000000819

I have followed the link, Naomi, and your pot looks a similar shape to the piece in the link that is a piece of functional ware produced in the Tetsuzo Ota kiln, which is in Koishiwara. From my point of view all that tells me is that it could have been made in Koishiwara but does not prove it and, as there seem to be 50 or so kilns in the area, there is nothing to suggest that this was made in this kiln.


The description of the modern pot in the link is a sake bottle with a spout and, as I said that is not typical of sake bottles (tokkuri) produced elsewhere in Japan. That does make it more likely to be made in Koishiwara and so I would be happy to agree that it was probably made in the Koishiwara region. If I was selling it that is all that I would be happy to say.