Aka-tamade is a type of gozu-aka-e, in which a white porcelain base is decorated with simple geometric patterns, such as red netting, or herbaceous floral patterns in red and green, with a beautiful red circle in the middle of the pattern, like a rising sun. There are various types of vessels such as incense containers, plates, and bowls, but incense containers have been especially prized in the tea ceremony since the mid-Edo period, and some of them fetched tens of thousands of yen per piece. Some people believe that incense containers are small miscellaneous vessels placed in the kiln as a reminder of the boundary between different vessels, as a color indicator of the kiln. In any case, these wares were fired in Shima in Fujian Province during the late Ming and early Qing periods in China.
