Tomb jar

Label Text

This tall slender tomb jar from the Southern Song dynasty is one of eight such elaborately decorated vessels that Freer displayed as pairs in the Peacock Room in Detroit. He purchased this example from the New York gallery of Yamanaka and Company, and he was told that it and other "specimens of this kind" had been "recovered from ancient Buddhist tombs" in Korea. While that was probably true, this particular jar is now known to be Chinese in origin and to date to the thirteenth century. Originally an accoutrement of burial in China as well as Korea, it would have been paired with another jar of the same shape, both of which would have held funeral offerings of grain meant to assist the deceased in the afterlife.

Object Name

Tomb jar

Ware

Qingbai ware

Dated

13th century

Period

Southern Song dynasty

Medium

Porcelain with bluish transparent (qingbai) glaze.

Dimensions

HxW: 36.7 x 11.0 cm

Country

China

Credit Line

Gift of Charles Lang Freer

Iteration

2

Shelf Number

18

Wall

North

Title

Tomb jar

Object Number

F1905.91

Freer Source

Yamanaka and Co.

Freer Source City

New York

Freer Source State

New York

Freer Source Country

United States

Image

http://141.217.97.109/plugins/Dropbox/files/peacock-jpg/JPEG/F1905.91.jpg

Collection

Citation

"Tomb jar," in The Peacock Room, Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Accession No. F1905.91, Item #3092, http://peacockroom.wayne.edu/items/show/3092 (accessed March 28, 2024).