porcelain

Porcelain comes from Middle French porcelaine, meaning both "cowrie" and "china, chinaware," which came from Old Italian porcellana, from Italian porcello, "piglet."

The word first named the glossy cowrie shell, and was later extended to chinaware because of its resemblance to that shell's smooth, gleaming surface.

It shares its root with Italian porcello, "piglet," though why a shell was ever named after a piglet is unclear.