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Lot Essay
Also known as 'cockscomb vases', pouch-shaped vessels such as the present flask attempted to recreate the form of a leather pilgrim flask that was so essential to the horse-riding cultures of the north. This ceramic form flourished during the eleventh century and became a standard artifact found in Liao tombs in Hebei, Liaoning and Inner Mongolia.
The angular shape of the present flask and its white stoneware body are quite unusual. An almost identical flask, from the tomb of a Liao Prince, is illustrated in Ryo no toji (Liao Dynasty Ceramics), Heihonsha, Tokyo, 1960, p. 9, fig. 10. Another was sold at Christie’s New York, 22 March 2019, lot 1736.
Another very similar flask is illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, Song Ceramics from the Kwan Collection, Hong Kong Museum of Art, 1994, pp. 390-91, no. 177, where it is described as Gangwa ware, Chifeng. Other flasks comparable in workmanship to the present flask have been found in royal Liao tombs such as a tomb dated to AD 959 at Chifeng, Inner Mongolia, illustrated by Liu Tao in Song Liao Jin jinian ciqi (Dated Ceramics of the Song, Liao and Jin Periods), Beijing, 2004, p. 68, figs. 4-7, and col. pl. 25.
The angular shape of the present flask and its white stoneware body are quite unusual. An almost identical flask, from the tomb of a Liao Prince, is illustrated in Ryo no toji (Liao Dynasty Ceramics), Heihonsha, Tokyo, 1960, p. 9, fig. 10. Another was sold at Christie’s New York, 22 March 2019, lot 1736.
Another very similar flask is illustrated in the exhibition catalogue, Song Ceramics from the Kwan Collection, Hong Kong Museum of Art, 1994, pp. 390-91, no. 177, where it is described as Gangwa ware, Chifeng. Other flasks comparable in workmanship to the present flask have been found in royal Liao tombs such as a tomb dated to AD 959 at Chifeng, Inner Mongolia, illustrated by Liu Tao in Song Liao Jin jinian ciqi (Dated Ceramics of the Song, Liao and Jin Periods), Beijing, 2004, p. 68, figs. 4-7, and col. pl. 25.