This plate made at the traditional ceramic center of Seto is an excellent example of the functional, unsophisticated, and regional folk described in Japanese as a 'stone plate' ('ishizara') and was used for food.
 
This particular design, known as horse-eye ('umanome'), was common on plates used at inns along the Tokaido Highway between Kyoto and Tokyo in the late Edo and early Meiji periods. 
 
Painted in iron oxide with five or six concentric spirals along the circumference of the plate, these represent horse eyes. Heavy and very durable, this plate is decorated in a cream crackled glaze.
 
This plate has been restored with gold. Old restoration probably from that time or later Meiji.
Only cracks, never been broken in half.