There is some confusion over nomenclature. High fired glazed ceramics were produced in the old Kingdom of Sukothai at Sisatchanalai, Pitsanaloke and near the city of Sukothai. Here the last are referred to as Sukothai Town wares. Some have called all these wares, and, indeed, other glazed stonewares -Sawankhalok.

Sukothai Town wares were probably produced from the early fourteenth century until the middle of the sixteenth century. Wares from the hundreds of kilns at Sisatchanalai were exported in enormous quantities to Indonesia and the Philippines. For long these wares, recovered from burial sites, were all that most people knew of Thai ceramics. The most intriguing questions about these kilns are their dating and their origin. It is now certain that the potters were indigenous - not imported Chinese - and the origin of the craft may have been to the north. Early, fourteenth century wares, some remarkably fine, were probably made for local consumption; but, after Ayuthya absorbed Sukothai at the beginning of the fifteenth century, Chinese merchants, based in Ayuthya, started an extensive export trade to fill the gap left when the Ming banned private exports. The industry must have come to an end soon after the Burmese destruction of the Thai world in 1569.