The pottery hill jar is a vessel made for burial with the dead in the Han dynasty. The cylindrical shape with feet derives from that of a bronze vessel. The cover in the shape of a conical mountain is like that of bronze incense burners of the time; the central group of peaks surrounded by lower peaks have a cosmic symbolism refering to the 'five sacred mountains'. In the mountains, the intermediary region between heaven and earth, wild animals, mythical creatures and immortals can all be found. These are depicted both among the high peaks on the cover and in the lower hills around the side of the vessel. See Kiyohiko Munakata, Sacred Mountains in Chinese Art, Urbana-Champaign, 1991, pp. 82-89

A very similar jar and cover is illustrated in Mayuyama, Seventy Years, vol. I, Tokyo, 1976, p. 37, no. 69; and another is illustrated by Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. I, London, 1994, p. 65, nos. 75 and 76