Talk:Willow pattern

Facts?
This entire article has been cut and pasted from the following website: . I can find no evidence for The Willow Pattern story being mysteriously taken over to Europe from "Eastern Lands" during the Crusades. All the evidence shows the story was invented two hundred years ago to sell English pottery. If no-one can post up some evidence to support it, I am going to remove this misinformation. This is meant to be an encylcopedia. Angstriddenyouth (talk) 13:13, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Willow Pattern special/unique edition.

On a recent visit to Lincoln Cathedral I noticed a small selection of Willow Pattern items on sale at the Cathedral's gift shop.

The county of Lincoln was home to the R.A.F's Bomber Command during the second world war and a special version of the Willow Pattern, which has a Lancaster Bomber in the upper left corner, was commissioned by the Cathedral and is sold uniquely in its gift shop.

Syncopator (talk) 01:06, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

My grandfather recited the story of the plate to my as a rhyme, which I still remember:

Far away within the East/ A monarch kept his state./ And near him, just across the bridge,/ There lived a prince (see plate)./ The monarch had a daughter fair./ The prince in love was he./ "No, No, good man," the monarch said./ "My daughter stays with me."/ Across the bridge the lovers fled./ The king pursued irate./ They hied them to a little boat,/ And sailed way (see plate)./ Alas the stormy winds did blow/ As cruel as cruel could be./ They dashed the boat upon the rocks,/ Drowned the lovers in the sea./ But changed to birds by fairies kind/ Their spirits rose elate./ And even now, around the king/ They hover still (see plate).

Number of Men on the bridge
I think the number of men depicted on the bridge is an indicator of the age of the pattern. I recall that the modern pattern had 3 men on the bridge but the older pattern only had two men. Obviously that like much of the rest of the article needs a citation. there is a song here suggesting three and 4 men

there is currently one item on ebay claiming 1940-1945 with 2 men only, and quite a lot of reference material for the article here EdwardLane (talk) 16:45, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Think, how would this convention be decided among the dozens of factories issuing Willow pattern wares? Who would enforce the decision? Could this be the way the adult world works?--Wetman (talk) 03:52, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

More commonly known as?
The article currently states that Willow Pattern is more commonly known as Blue Willow. Is there a source for this? I work with ceramics daily and I've never heard it called blue willow. All the sources for the article seem to call it willow pattern as well. I don't doubt that some people or at some point called it blue willow, but is it really more common? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.205.184.212 (talk) 19:33, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

Shaolin Fable
I'm unable to find any source for the secret Shaolin fable mentioned in this article. In fact, after searching for a while, it appears that this article is the only source for that story. It's discussed in this paper:, in which the author writes, "More recently, there has been another attempt to give a “genuine” Chinese character to the Willow Pattern story. Since the story is offered without citation (and appears in no scholarly work on Willow Pattern porcelain that I am aware of) it is included here as an example of the continuing appeal of the story, as well as efforts to legitimize it as Chinese." Judging from the paper's bibliography, it appears that the Wikipedia article was the primary source here as well. Unless someone has an objection or can provide a source, I think the "Shaolin fable" should be removed from this arcticle. Preston stone (talk) 01:02, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

The animation mentioned is quite a bit different from the main article (Couple are called Takaka and Nyoki (spelling may be wrong) and the daughter is set to marry a Samurai warrior. They flee in a boat and her father is drowned while chasing her. They find a life together but the samurai finds them and kills them both himself. I think this is the problem with something like this is that there are so many artistic interpretations of what is ostensible a fable. And as a fable, can there be a 'set' source? (Even Aesop was mostly a collection of folk-lore) JoeCovenant (talk) 11:10, 25th July 2014 (UTC)
 * Think: what would be the nature of a "secret fable"?--Wetman (talk) 03:56, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

willow pattern origins
I have read many times that the willow pattern was invented by Minton in England, yet I have a Qanlong period rice bowl (1736-96) hand-decorated with a version of this pattern...did the maker copy Thomas Minton's design and export it to Europe? Gordian3 (talk) 08:26, 29 December 2015 (UTC)gordian3

Van Gulik was the first sinologist describing the willow pattern. In his appendix to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Willow_Pattern_%28novel%29 he explains that was so popular in Europe that chinese kilns start producing it for western markets. --151.51.144.35 (talk) 00:21, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Missing a name for that saw maker
"The prominent Sheffield (England) firm of saw makers (1837-1957) used the willow pattern as one of their brands. They created a special saw handle fixing (the largest known on any saw) and a design that was etched on to the blade of the saw.[11]"

Is a nice little detail, but surely needs the name of the firm if possible? Which'll need someone with a copy of the book cited.

SkagwayEntropy (talk) 13:27, 20 June 2017 (UTC)

Nearly four years later, still no name, and without it the entry is meaningless so I have commented it out until whenever.

Terry Pratchett, now the late Sir Terry Pratchett, in one of his fantastic tales told how an oriental domestic disaster led to the loss of all the pigments but blue. I will try to find it later this week. J S Ayer (talk) 02:59, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

Discrepancy between English and Swedish versions of the article
As far as I can see, the Swedish version of this article (one of only a handful of versions) gives no indication that the pattern is not originally Chinese, whereas the English one strongly suggests this (and the "blue and white pottery" article states "The willow pattern, said to tell the sad story of a pair of star-crossed lovers, was an entirely European design"). I've reported this discrepancy on the Swedish talk page. I'm not certain which version is correct - but the English version is far more detailed, and I'm inclined to think it's correct.213.127.210.95 (talk) 14:17, 27 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Trust your instincts! Johnbod (talk) 14:19, 27 June 2018 (UTC)