Chinese Ceramics & Antiques Discussion

Antique Chinese Ceramics => Chinese Ceramics Discussion => Topic started by: heavenguy on Apr 06, 2017, 01:59:40

Title: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 06, 2017, 01:59:40
Hello,

Again, i know I shouldn't be buying stuff from eBay but I bought a few pear shaped vases and a small jar.

This is one of the vases. It has the shaped of Yuan or song pear shaped vase but a  little bit flat. Usually I see them with a more elongated body.  The foot rim is not tall and glazed. Around 6 1/2 inches tall. Looks like stoneware.

Any information provided will be of much help.

Thank you in advance.
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 06, 2017, 02:00:02
more pics
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 06, 2017, 02:00:28
foot rim
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 06, 2017, 02:00:53
The glazed foot rim.

Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: Stan on Apr 06, 2017, 09:41:39
This is late Qing or early republic, I know that the Chinese that built the railroads for Trans Union Pacific in 1867 left bottles like these behind afterwards, I know here in Oregon you see them all the time in antique stores, I bought a couple of them that someone had found near the railroad in Coberg Oregon.
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: peterp on Apr 06, 2017, 11:31:38
Interesting. I would have had difficulty in dating these. As is with monochromes you can rely almost only on shape and foot rim. Unfortunately, as soon as it comes to the southern or non-mainstream kilns dating is difficult. Is it sure these were made in China?
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 06, 2017, 21:06:16
When i bought this, they also had a shiwan ginger jar with these type of vases too. That could explain it. What makes me a little suspicious of the vases is that they all look similar but with different glazes. I'll take a picture when there is more sunlight.
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: peterp on Apr 07, 2017, 10:40:23
Stan's remark induced me to look into this a bit and I found this:
web.stanford.edu/group/chineserailroad/cgi-bin/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/14_Commentary_Praetzellis_Praetzellis.pdf

You will find a heap of similar bottles farther down in this PDF document.

Here is another one from farterh south:
sha.org/assets/documents/Choy - pottery research - final version.pdf

Usually we attribute items of this type to southern or coastal kilns. Those were not mainstream kilns that were often  producing simple wares for the common folks.  Such items were frequently made in coastal areas of Fujian, and down to Guangdong province, but probably also elsewhere in lesser kilns. The south was the main exit point for exports, but also for emigration in those times.
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 07, 2017, 23:42:48
Thank you Stan and Peterp,

So this are basically, vases and jars they used to import food from China. It looks like they did a number of different types of glazes on them. They all have kind of the same size, dimensions and foot rim but just the glaze is different. I attached of all the different glazes

The wide mouth jar I also asked about in a post it's probably was used to store soybean sauces.

I will attach the different glazes I got and how similar the foot rims look.

Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 07, 2017, 23:43:23
glazes
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: heavenguy on Apr 07, 2017, 23:44:16
Thank you both once again for the nice information. The Pdfs are a great addition to my library.
Title: Re: Yuan or Song pear shaped vase.
Post by: peterp on Apr 08, 2017, 08:11:17
Some black glazes are essentially such a dark brown, that they look black. The variations in glaze colors seen can be a slight difference  in the glaze composition or density, but often the cause is firing related. Like different temperature, different position in a kiln, etc.  Items fired in the same batch may develop slightly different hues or colors, although they have essentially the same type of glaze. That is also the reason why some black items show a brownish tone at the glaze edge.