Fragment of base of a celadon-glazed stoneware jar or dish

Object Details

• Description

  Shape: Shard consists of approximately half of the base of a celadon-glazed white stoneware jar or, less likely, dish. The presumption that the shard was originally the base of a jar is based on the fact that there is no footring, with the base showing only a slight concavity. The shard thickness varies between 1.4 and 1.8 cm.

  Clay: Fine, light-gray stoneware with fine dark inclusions and many air pockets, some of them quite large. The clay body is beige in the center and on the exposed bottom. The slightly concave bottom shows drag marks and rings from the final carving of the base.

  Glaze: The bubbly, pale-green glaze shows a broad crackle pattern. The glaze is a substantially darker, almost emerald color where it has pooled in the center of the base. Where it is thinly applied, especially on the outside of the shard, the glaze is almost clear, contributing only a slight greenish tint to the underlying light-gray stoneware body.

  Decoration: None.

  Marks: None.

• 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 2 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.

• Collection

  Freer Study Collection

• Previous custodian or owner

  Dr. John Alexander Pope (1906-1982)

• Origin

  Ban Kruat kilns, Buriram province, Northeast Thailand

• 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

  1100s, 1200s

• Name

  Pope, John Alexander

• Place

  Buriram province, China, Ban Kruat kilns

• Topic

  Ban Kruat ware, Art, Green glaze, Stoneware, Chinese Art, Ceramics, Angkor period (802 - 1431)

• Culture

  Chinese

• Object Type

  Vessels (containers)