A Preliminary Study on the Roles of Fe Content and Neoformed Ca-rich Minerals in the Coloration of Ceramic Glazes

Iron oxides are the essential coloring oxides in traditional ceramic glazes. However, when Fe is involved in the coloration in the form of ions or colloids in glazes with low Fe content, it is difficult to identify the iron oxide phases. Generally, in many these glazes, Ca-rich minerals are observed by X-ray diffraction (XRD) or microscopic images, owing to their devitrification by the high Ca content. This study attempts to elucidate the correlation between the crystalline structure and coloration in the glazes while mainly focusing on neoformed Ca-rich minerals and Fe content. An experimental firing was carried out to produce tree ash glazes, with pine tree ash and Buyeo feldspar. In the case of oxidation glazes, the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images and XRD patterns did not exhibit any Ca-rich crystals, and all the visible light reflectance spectra lines exhibited a similar shape. In contrast, the reduction glazes divided into blue glazes and other colored glazes according to the shapes of their reflectance spectra. It was confirmed that the influence of Ca-rich minerals on the glaze color was more pronounced than the blue color of the reduction glazes when the Ca and feldspar contents were sufficiently high and low, respectively, to form wollastonite. As the Ca content increased and the elemental composition of the reduction glazes changed, the neoformation of the Ca-rich minerals, such as wollastonite, anorthite, diopside, and akermanite was sequentially observed.