Porcelain styles, and there are several modern industrial manufacturers. These exported Chinese porcelains were held in such great esteem in Europe that in English "china" became a commonly–used synonym for the Italian term "porcelain". The first mention of porcelain in Europe is in "Il Milione" by Marco Polo in XII sec. Apart from copying Chinese porcelain in "faience" (tin glazed earthenware), the soft-paste Medici porcelain in 16th-century Florence was the first real European attempt to reproduce it, with little success. Early in the 16th century, Portuguese traders returned home with samples of kaolin, which they discovered in China to be essential
French porcelain about a decade later by styles leading to Art Deco. The display of Sèvres porcelain in the English Country House is another by-product of the 19th century and flourishes especially within what is known as 'Rothschildshire' (the county of Buckinghamshire). The family's history of collecting and its development of the distinctive ‘goût Rothschild’ (Rothschild style) results in some of the most iconic Sèvres being located at Waddesdon Manor, Baron de Rothschild's weekend 'pleasure house'. As Mark Girouard denotes, "opulence was the key-note of this" and thus "eighteenth-century French furniture, porcelain and bronzes of superb quality combined" dominated this specific 19th-century