Landscapes signified more than the beauty of the natural world to the Japanese people。They  believed that their native gods had created the islands of Japan and come down to dwell in their mountains, rivers, and trees. Japanese artists developed distinctive styles of full-color painting that they often preferred to create images of the rounded, heavily forested hills that surrounded their ancient capital cities. From the thirteenth century onward, they also mastered Chinese ink painting techniques and adapted them to create landscapes of both China and Japan. In Japanese ceramics from the sixteenth century onward, as techniques of glazing and application of pigments became more prevalent, landscapes became an important subject of ceramic design and appreciation.