A chawan (茶碗; literally “tea bowl”) is a bowl used for preparing and drinking tea. There are many types of chawan used in East Asian tea ceremonies. The choice of their use depends upon many considerations.
The chawan originated in China. The earliest chawan in Japan were imported from China between the 13th and the 16th century.
The Jian chawan, a Chinese tea bowl known as Tenmoku chawan in Japan, was the preferred tea bowl for the Japanese tea ceremony up until the 16th century. In Japan, tea was also mainly drunk from this Chinese variety of tea bowls up till about the 15th century. The Japanese term tenmoku is derived from the name of the Tianmu Mountain, where Japanese priests acquired these tea bowls from Chinese temples to bring back to Japan according to tradition.