TANG DYNASTY (AD 618-907)

The Bactrian camel was not indigenous to China. Ezekiel Schloss, in Ancient Chinese Ceramic Sculpture, Connecticut, 1977, vol. I, pl. 220, discusses the importation of tens of thousands of camels from the states of the Tarim Basin, Eastern Turkestan, and Mongolia. The Tang state even created a special office to supervise the imperial camel herds which carried out various state assignments, including military courier service for the northern frontier. The camel was also used by the court and the merchants for local transportation and, of course, were the ‘ships of the desert’ linking China to the oasis cities of central Asia, Samarkand, Persia and Syria.

A similar figure of a Bactrian camel with a fringed and splash-glazed blanket, and cream glaze on the heavy areas of hair in contrast to the amber body, is illustrated by Mizuno in Toujitaikei, vol. 35, Tousansai (Tang sancai), Heibonsha series, 1977, pl. 100. Another large braying figure of a camel, but with monster-mask packs, is illustrated in Oriental Ceramics, The World’s Great Collections, vol. 5: The British Museum, London, Tokyo, 1981, pl. 7. See, also, the similar figure sold at Christie’s New York, 17 March 2017, lot 1136; another one sold at Christie’s Paris, 21-22 June 2016, lot 366; and the very similar massive figure sold at Christie’s Paris, 15 June 2005, lot 130.