Fragment of the rim and base of low celadon dish

Object Details

• Description

  Shape: Fragment of the wall and base of a 5.5 cm-high celadon dish. Original diameter of the dish was approximately 22 - 25 cm. The dish wall is 0.6-0.7 cm thick. The undercut glazed footring is about 0.5 cm high. The rim of the dish undulates slightly in a manner which echoes the impressed fluting in the cavetto.

  Clay: Fine light-gray clay with many small air pockets and a modest number of dark inclusions. The clay has burned bright red where the base was exposed to the kiln atmosphere during firing. The interior of the normally gray body is a light buff shading to an orange-red above the foot and at places along the fracture line.

  Glaze: A thick, rich, green celadon which completely covers the mouth, wall, and footring, both inside and out. The glaze is heavily crackled. A ring of glaze was removed from the base before firing to allow for placement of a kiln support.

  Decoration: Underglaze impressed fluting extends from the edge of the mirror up the cavetto almost all the way to the gently undulating rim of the dish. The mirror is surrounded by a slightly raised ridge which marks the lower margin of the cavetto fluting. The outside of the dish wall is undecorated.

  Marks: None.

• Previous custodian or owner

  Dr. John Alexander Pope (1906-1982)

• Provenance

  To 1957

  John A. Pope (1906-1982), Washington DC, collected between August 1956 and April 1957 in Angkor, Cambodia. [1]

  From 1957

  Freer Gallery of Art, gift of John A. Pope, Washington DC [2]

  Notes:

  [1] See Curatorial Remark 1 in the object record. See also “Ceramics in Mainland and Southeast Asia: Collections in the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery”, copy in object file, Collections Management Office.

  [2] See note 1. See also object file, Collections Management Office.

• Origin

  Longquan, Zhejiang province, China

• Credit Line

  Gift of John A. Pope

• Type

  Vessel

• Restrictions and Rights

  Usage Conditions Apply

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Keep Exploring

• Related Resources

  collections.si.edu

• Date

  1300s

• Name

  Pope, John Alexander

• Place

  China, Zhejiang province, Longquan

• Topic

  Art, Green glaze, Stoneware, Chinese Art, Longquan ware, Yuan dynasty (1279 - 1368)

• Culture

  Chinese

• Object Type

  Vessels (containers)