XIONG Lu，TANG Min，WU Lin，YUAN Feng，FANG Tao，YU Yongbin
(The Ancient Ceramic Research Center, Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute, Jingdezhen 333403, Jiangxi, China)

Abstract: Phoenix is one of the representative motifs in Chinese traditional culture. In this study, typical phoenix patterns from different historical periods have been selected as the research objects, then features representing their changes in chronological order are extracted and digitalized, and discriminant functions are built for dating them, breaking the cognitive limits of the visual and empirical observations. Experimental results show that the transformation of the extracted digitalized microscopic details of the phoenix patterns can reflect the evolution of the social and aesthetic values in the course of history, and the established discriminant functions can identify the historical origins of the phoenix patterns in a reliable and efficient way. They provide a new way for the identification of ceramics.

Key words: phoenix; digitalized characteristics; modelling evolution; accumulation of experience