AN INCISED CIZHOU MEIPING

SONG CERAMICS

Details

AN INCISED CIZHOU MEIPING
NORTHERN SONG DYNASTY

Of slender ovoid form surmounted by a waisted cylindrical neck and decorated with a series of bands encircling the swelling body, beginning with overlapping petals at the high shoulder above further bands of knobbed scroll, freely incised lingzhi heads, lotus buds and broad lappets bordering the wide, central register decorated with leafy vine, each reserved on a stamped 'fish roe' ground and separated by plain, undecorated bands, applied with an even, creamy white glaze of ivory tone over the incised decoration which remains a pale taupe brown
13 7/8in. (32.7cm.) high, box

Lot Essay

A meiping of the same form and with the same type of decoration, but with a different arrangement of horizontal bands, from the Bristol City Art Gallery, was included in the exhibition, The Arts of the Sung Dynasty, June 16-July 23, 1960 and illustrated in T.O.C.S, 1959-60, pl. 36, no. 102, and also illustrated in Chinese Art, Fry et al., London, 1935, pl. 34.

Meiping of this type, with rounded sides, small everted mouth, stamped 'fish roe' and decoration of clouds, fan-like leaves and overlapping petals in horizontal bands, are grouped by Yutaka Mino among the early wares of this type and are thought to have come from the Guantaichen kiln site in Hebei province. See the exhibition Catalogue, Freedom of Clay and Brush through Seven Centuries in Northern China: Tz'u-chou Type Wares, 960-1600 A.D., Indianapolis Museum of Art, 1980, p. 78, where the authors Mino and Tsang discuss, and also illustrate, the above cited example from the Bristol City Art Gallery