Bat printing

Technique of cold transfer of an overglaze design to pottery, developed in England in the late 18th century. The process involved creating a design on a printing plate; then a bat, a thin sheet of gelatinous substance, was used instead of paper to pick up the oiled design from the plate and transfer it to the ceramic surface. Color in powder form was dusted onto the porcelain; only the oiled parts having the design retained the pigment. First designs were primarily in black, thus it is also called "black printing."