Page 264 - Christies Fine Chinese Works of Art March 2016 New York

1543 THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN

1543

A RARE CIZHOU-TYPE CUT-GLAZE
‘TORTOISE’-SHAPED CANTEEN
JIN-YUAN DYNASTY, 13TH CENTURY

The compressed water bottle is covered
with a lustrous brown glaze cut to reveal
an abstract foral design encircling a bird in
fight, all within double line borders. The
sides are encircled by a groove divided by
four short strap handles, below the wide, fat
rim. The slightly rounded, conical lower
body tapers to a fat, unglazed ring foot.

10º in. (26.1 cm.) diam.

$7,000-9,000

PROVENANCE

The Walter Hochstadter (1914-2007)
Collection, and thence by descent to the
present owner.

A very similar Cizhou-type cut-glaze canteen with
four straps spanning the encircling groove, and
a shorter spout, dated Xixia or Jin-Yuan dynasty,
late 12th-13th century, was sold at Christie’s New
York, The Collection of Robert Hatfeld Ellsworth
Part IV, 20 March 2015, lot 844. The Ellsworth
bottle was illustrated by R. D. Mowry in Hare’s
Fur, Tortoiseshell, and Partridge Feathers: Chinese
Brown- and Black-Glazed Ceramics, 400-1400,
Cambridge, 1996, pp. 202-204, no. 75, where
the author notes, p. 203, that canteens of this
fattened type are known as bianhu. Another with
decoration cut or carved through a black glaze,
dated 12th-13th century, in the Victoria and Albert
Museum, is illustrated by R. Kerr in ‘Kiln Sites
of Ancient China’, Transactions of the Oriental
Ceramic Society, Vol. 46, 1981-82, p. 61, pl. 18.
This latter bottle has a short spout but no groove
or straps.
金/元 磁州系褐釉剔花四繫扁壺

PROPERTY FROM A TEXAS COLLECTION

1544

A LARGE WHITE-GLAZED VASE
LIAO DYNASTY (AD 907-1125)

The high-shouldered vase has a tall, slender
neck and a dish-shaped mouth, and is
covered overall with a white slip under a
creamy white glaze stopping short of the
unglazed foot.

15æ in. (40 cm.) high

$4,000-6,000

遼 白瓷盤口瓶

1544

262