Term Celadon

The term translated as "Celadon" has a very ambiguous meaning in Chinese

As far as I am concerned celadon is a glaze that has a greenish hue, but is not outright, flat green. The Chinese/Japanese term is written 青 (and reads 'qing' in mandarin)' its usage in both languages is different, but in both languages it is very ambiguous.
Not sure if those who started using the word 'celadon' were aware that the Chinese character 青 for this type of glaze has actually a multitude of definitions or usages. The western term 'celadon' is more straightforward, and limits the meaning almost exclusively to a greenish/bluish hue of glazes. That is good.

In Japanese the same character has a slightly different usage compared to the Chinese. For example, in Chinese the character 藍 (mandarin reading = lan) is commonly used for the color blue, but in Japanese the character 青 (used for celadon) is the term that is widely used for the color blue. For example, it is used for a 'blue' sky, but also used for a 'green' traffic light!

The  character 青 is not at all used for the colors 'blue' or 'green' proper, in common Chinese. For that they use 藍 (for blue) and 綠 (for green), including the green traffic light, mentioned above.
In view to glazes, apart from its use for a greenish or bluish glaze, the same character is also used for glazes that we would call gray, grayish, yellowish and some other undefined colors.
Still more ... in addition to the above the original glazes which were natural, not applied by man, but which were the result of soot dropping from the hot kiln roof unto the pottery items is also called this way.
Very confusing...

Apart from its use for the glaze color it is also used to describe early ceramics of the Han dynasty etc., which had no glaze proper or a "natural" glaze. "Natural" means here something glaze-like developing inside the kiln. Repeated firing resulted in soot adhering to the kiln walls and ceiling, which was heated and liquefied during subsequent kiln firings and dripped down from the kiln ceiling unto the ceramics being fired below. This soot became a sort of early glaze. But as it was only covering the surfaces where the drops fell, any areas underneath the widest diameter would not be "glazed".

What further complicates use or understanding of the Chinese term is its use by Chinese speakers involved with Chinese ceramics. They use it also for what we would call gray, early yellowish or brownish glazes, etc.

This is a problem existing with other glaze colors too, however, because they keep calling glaze colors as the Chinese did hundreds or a thousand years ago. This results sometimes in names that would be completely different in modern times, even sometimes the same glaze color being called with several different terms.

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