During the early A.D 2000s, many celadon and white wares started to surface in the Jakarta antique market. The sellers said they were artefacts from a wreck located about 34 km offshore from Jepara. Unfortunate, no immediate action was taken by the government to stop the lootings. According to the article "The Jepara Wreck" written by Mr Atma Djuana and Edmund Edwards Mckinnon, some available reports indicated that the wreck was either broken in two or there was a smaller but contemporary wreck in the same area. The area was strangely strewn with large boulders. Among the artifacts surfaced in the Jakarta antique market, there was a stone anchor about 2.5 m in length. According to the authors, a similar anchor was displayed at the Maritime Museum in Quanzhou. Hence, suggesting that the ship may be a Chinese Junk. It was also suggested that the Junk sank as early as A.D 1130. The latest copper coins recovered from the wreck that the authors had seen was from Zhonghe (重和), the last year of this reign mark being A.D 1118. However, I have seen some later coins of Jian Yian (建炎）purportedly from this wreck. The last year of Jian Yian reign is A.D 1130. Personally, I believe the wreck could be later than A.D 1130, probably around A.D 1150 to 1175. The reason for my dating will be discussed below.

Subsequently I came across a paper written by Mr Jujun Kurniawan who was involved in the salvaging of the Jepara wreck in 2007 which by the time of the operation was already largely looted. But there are still significant amount of information available. As in some of the 12th cent. wrecks, there were also small quantity of Jingdezhen qingbai wares.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/324674528_SOME_NOTE_ON_THE_SALVAGING_JEPARA_SHIPWRECK

Quanzhou in Fujian Province was a cosmopolitan port known to Marco Polo as Zayton. It was the largest seaport in Asia during the Song/Yuan period. Many regions especially those located in the coastal areas in Fujian Province capitalised on their proximity to the Quanzhou port to produce export porcelains. The bulk of the trade ceramics consisted of green wares (celadon), white/qingbai and black/brown wares.

According to Song period Zhao Rugua's work "zhufanzhi" (A.D 1225) (赵汝适《诸番志》), 46 countries (including Annam, Cambodia, Srivijaya, Malay peninsula, Borneo, Java, Eastern Indies, the Philippines and even Zanzibar) were listed as China's trading partners and the Yuan period "Daoyi zhilue" by Wang Dayan ( 汪大淵《岛夷志略》 listed at least 58 countries.

The map in the Quanzhou museum showing the maritime trade routes originating from Quanzhou is shown below. Jepara is along the trade route but whether it was the destination of the ship which sank near there, it is unable to ascertain.

In the wreck, there are large and smaller bowls with carved and combed/dotted decorations on the interior and vertical combed lines on the external wall. This was commonly termed as Tongan type or Juko (shuko seiji) greenware (name after Juko (shuko) a Japanese monk tea ceremony master). In fact, this was a continuation of the Longquan tradition. Longquan kilns started producing such type around Mid/late Northern Song period. Kamei Meitoku in his article "Chronology of Longquan wares of the Song and Yuan periods" classified them into 1st half of 12th century. But from the significant quantity found in the Huaguang Jiao 1 wreck which is dated to around 1162 A.D ( based on agreen glaze bowl with incised cyclical date ren wu (壬午载潘三郎造)), the Fujian version continued to be produced at least till around 1175 A.D.

The centre of production in Southern Fujian was Nan an (南安) which boasted more than 47 kilns. Together with nearby kilns such as Tong an （同安）, Anxi （安溪）, Xiamen （厦门）and further away such Minhou （闽侯）, Fuqing （福清）, Putian （莆田） and Lianjiang （连江）, this group of kilns produced similar green products for overseas market. However, it should also be noted that Northern Fujian kilns also produced similar wares.

The colour tone of such Fujian wares varies from olive green, grayish green to different degree of yellow. In comparison with the Longquan version, the quality was less refined and for most pieces the outer lower portion of the bowls were left unglazed. For the Longquan version, only the outer base was left unglazed.

Fujian green glaze plates with carved floral decoration (Photo credit: Walter Kassela)

Fujian potters also introduced new decorations for their products. One of the most popular decoraiton is abstract cloud motif. Based on kiln archaeological findings, Lianjiang Pukou kiln has been identified as a major production site.

There are also large number of celadon bowls with carved lotus motif. Such type was first produced in Longquan kiln and copied by Fujian kilns. Both the Longquan and Fujian version were present in the wreck. The Longquan and majority of the Fujian bowls do not have any vertical combed lines on the external wall. Kamei Meitoku dates such Longquan bowl to A.D 1150 - 1200 A.D. In the wreck, there are also some quantity of sketchily carved lotus decoration Fujian bowls with carved lines on the exterior. Longquan potters basically ceased decorating the exterior of bowls with combed vertical lines by 1150 A.D. However, the Fujian potters continued to use it for a couple of decades for some of their products.

Another type of Longquan celadon bowls with paneled stylised motif (see below photo) were also found. According to Kamei, they made their appearance during the 1150 - 1200 A.D period.

There are also some big celadon bowls decorated with wild goose and floral scrolls motif. Such bowls were attributed to Anfu kiln in Longquan and example could be found in the book on "Ceramics from the Tioman Island". The author in the book gave the Anfu attribution based on archaeological report from China.

The Jepara wreck also carried a substantial quantity of white/qingbai wares, including cover boxes, bowls, kendis and vases. Majority of the white wares were likely products of Dehua Wanpinglun (盖德碗坪崙） kiln which were dated to late Northern Song Period by the Chinese archaeologist. There were large quantity cover boxes, with varying sizes and impressed floral/abstract motif or plain without motif .

The wreck also carried significant number of Dehua large white glaze bowls, either plain or decorated with abstract combed decoration

There are also kendis with impressed floral/waves decoration. Besides those with creamy white glaze, there are also those which have a light bluish qingbai colour tone.

There are also bottle-shaped vases and small number of floral-shaped mouth vases with impressed floral decoration.

Qingbai wares recovered included ewers and bowls. It is interesting to note that those ewers which were produced in Southern Fujian kilns, shared much similarity to that found in the Sabah Flying Fish wreck which was dated to the closing years of Northern Song period.

In this category, there are dark brown glaze kendis, jarlets and celadon glaze kendis with iron-brown painted abstract motif. They are most likely product from the Fujian Cizao kiln in Quanzhou.

The presence of the Jianyan copper coins means that the wreck is dated later than A.D 1130. As discussed above, based on archaeological evidence those Fujian and Longquan green glaze can be dated to the 1150 - 1200 A.D phase. The Dehua wares were likely from Dehua Wan Pinglun kiln and dated to the late Northern Song phase by Chinese archaeologist. It is likely that the production may have persisted into the early Southern Song period. The Dehua wares from Huaguang Jiao 1 wreck dated to 1162 A.D were stylistically different from the Jepara wreck. This gives an indication that Jepara wreck could be earlier than Huaguang Jiao 1 wreck.

In the article written by Mr Jujun Kurniawan, there was an elongated octagonal qingbai ewer and some large brown Guangdong/Fujian jars which were similar to that found in the Huaguang Jiao 1 wreck (华光礁一号沉船) . Huaguang Jiao 1 has a green glaze bowl with incised cyclical date ren wu (壬午载潘三郎造) , equivalent to 1162 A.D and was dated to around that date.

Taking into consideration the above references, it is reasonable to date the wreck conservatively to around 1150 - 1175 A.D. However, there are credible evidences, such as the late Northern Song dating for Flying Fish wreck and Wan Pinglun Dehua wares, to suggest that the Jepara wreck is from the transitional phase from Northern to South Song period. Hence, it is possibly closer towards the 1150 A.D dating.

2. Chronology of Longquan Wares of the Song and Yuan Period by Kamei Meitoku. Article published in the book "New Light on Chinese Yue and Longquan wares" edited by Chumei Ho.