Fragment of the base of a large celadon dish

Object Details

• Description

  Shape: Fragment of the base of a large celadon dish. Wheel thrown. Diameter of the footring is approximately 16.0 cm. The base of the dish is approximately 1.6 cm thick inside the footring while the lower wall is 1.1 cm thick.

  Clay: Moderately rough gray clay with many fine inclusions and small air pockets. The clay is uniformly gray except for the unglazed stacking ring inside the footring on the base and along a fracture line where the body burned brick-red during firing.

  Glaze: The opaque green celadon glaze is very thick but has a whitish cast and a generally "curdled" look to it, most likely the result of underfiring. There are many pin holes in the glaze, especially in the mirror of the dish, and some of them are quite large. The glaze has a "lumpy" feel to it, especially at the bottom of the wall immediately above the footring.

  Decoration: There appears to be a circle of incised floral decoration under the glaze in the mirror of the dish, but this cannot be definitely confirmed due to the opacity of the thick glaze.

  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

  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), Ceramics, Flowers

• Culture

  Chinese

• Object Type

  Vessels (containers)