Bulb bowl, Numbered Jun ware

This very heavily potted shallow bulb bowl stands on three cloud-collar feet. The exterior is ornamented with two rows of bosses, one below the mouth, the other above the feet. The bowl is covered with a pale blue glaze that is slightly flushed with purple inside. A very thin layer of olive brown glaze covers the base, where the number ba (eight) is inscribed; there are irregular spur marks as well. This bulb bowl represents a distinctive family of Junware mold-made bulb bowls, flowerpots, and flowerpot stands. Because a number ranging from one to ten always is incised on the base, these ceramics are known in the West as “Numbered Jun” ware. To date, no works from this group of ceramics have been unearthed from a tomb. Kiln complexes producing these wares were excavated in 1974 at the Juntai site in Yu xian, Henan Province.(1) In addition to “Numbered Jun” wares, several other types of ceramics — including a brown-painted Cizhou-ware wine jar analogous to the Lehman Yuandynasty (1279 – 1368) piece (No. 287) — were found.(2) A ceramic mold for making coins, marked Xuan He yuan bao, was also excavated at the Juntai kiln site (Xuan He was the reign-title of the Song dynasty emperor Hui Zong in 1119). A ceramic fragment inscribed Feng Hua, the name of a Song dynasty palace, was found there as well. Because of these discoveries, Chinese authorities were convinced that the “Numbered Jun” wares could be dated to the late Northern Song period.(3) Many scholars in the West, however, deferred a Northern Song attribution until further evidence was forthcoming.(4) A number of very coarsely potted blue-glazed bulb bowls and tripodal flowerpots in shapes that resemble some of the “Numbered Jun” vessels was found among the remains of a Chinese merchant ship that sank off the southwestern coast of Korea, near Sinan.(5) The salvage operations of this ship, which began in 1976, eventually produced almost 18,000 articles; close to 16,800 of these objects were pottery. More than 150 packing slips, in the form of wood tags, were retrieved from these remains. From the inscriptions on some of these tags, it is reasonably certain that the ship sailed for Japan from what is now the modern port of Ningbo, in Zhejiang Province, not long after June 1323. A flowerpot of this coarsely potted Jun-type ware (sometimes called “Jinhua Jun”) was also excavated at the site of the Yuan dynasty capital, Dadu, in Beijing.(6) Some authorities believed that these Sinan and Dadu discoveries helped to substantiate a date as late as the fourteenth century for the “Numbered Jun” wares. In the 1990s, Chinese scholars began to question the authenticity of the Xuan He yuan bao coin mold; it, as well as the ceramic fragment inscribed Feng Hua, eventually were discredited.(7) Furthermore, as documented here,(8) it was recognized that ceramics such as the Cizhou wares found with the “Numbered Jun” material at the Juntai kiln site were characteristic of wares produced during the Jin and Yuan dynasties. In 2004, further excavations at the Juntai kiln site produced several more “Numbered Jun” wares.(9) These “Numbered Jun” pieces(10) were found in an ash pit with at least seven other types of ceramics, including wares with soy-sauce colored glazes, white glazes, and turquoise glazes.(11) The Shanghai Museum, using thermoluminescence testing, has shown that most of the other wares found in the ash pit with the “Numbered Jun” were manufactured during the late Yuan to early Ming (1368 – 1644) periods.(12) In 2005, the Shanghai Museum tested samples from different Jun-ware kiln sites with thermoluminescence and determined that two fragments of the distinctive “Numbered Jun” wares excavated in 1974 from the Juntai kilns were manufactured in the fourteenth century, during the late Yuan or early Ming periods.(13) Although the date of this special group of “Numbered Jun” ceramics continues to be given as any time ranging from the Song dynasty to the Ming dynasty, fifteenth century, tangible documentary evidence seems to support the attribution of late Yuan to early Ming dynasty, fourteenth century, given here.

Catalogue entry from Suzanne G. Valenstein. The Robert Collection. Decorative Arts, Volume XV. Wolfram Koeppe, et al. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in association with Princeton University Press, 2012, pp. 307-309.


NOTES:
1. Henan Sheng Bowuguan. “Henan Yu xian Juntai yaozhi de fajue” (Excavation of the Juntai Kiln-Site at Yu Xian, Henan Province). Wenwu, 1975, no. 6, pls. 7, 10,1, 11, 12, 15, 16; see also Henan Sheng Wenwu Kaogu Yanjiusuo. Henan gu dai ci yao (The Ancient Kilns of Henan Province). Taibei, 2002, colorpls. pp. 190, 191, 196 – 99. Compare this Lehman bulb bowl to Henan chutu taoci (Ceramics Excavated in Henan). Exhibition, Hong Kong University Museum and Art Gallery, 15 March – 24 May 1997. Organized in association with the Henan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology. Catalogue. Hong Kong, 1997, nos. 56, 57, 98. See also Henan gu dai ci yao, colorpls. pp. 196, 198, 199, were excavated from this Juntai kiln site in 1974.
2. Henan Sheng Bowuguan. “Henan Yu xian Juntai yaozhi de fajue” (Excavation of the Juntai Kiln-Site at Yu Xian, Henan Province). Wenwu, 1975, no. 6, pls. 8, 15. Other brownpainted Cizhou wares from this 1974 Juntai excavation include a tiger-shaped pillow, attributed to the Jin dynasty, and a basin, attributed to the Yuan dynasty (Henan chutu taoci (Ceramics Excavated in Henan). Exhibition, Hong Kong University Museum and Art Gallery, 15 March – 24 May 1997. Organized in association with the Henan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology. Catalogue. Hong Kong, 1997, nos. 77, 88). See also Henan Sheng Wenwu Kaogu Yanjiusuo. Henan gu dai ci yao (The Ancient Kilns of Henan Province). Taibei, 2002: a red-and-green painted Cizhou-ware fragment, attributed to the Jin dynasty (pl. p. 202); part of a brown-painted Cizhou pillow, ascribed to the Jin period (pl. p. 203); and fragments of other brown-painted Cizhou wares, dated to the Yuan dynasty (pls. pp. 204 – 6, 208 – 10).
3. Feng Xianming et al. Eds. Zhongguo taoci shi (History of Chinese Ceramics). Beijing, 1982, pp. 260 – 64; Henan chutu taoci (Ceramics Excavated in Henan). Exhibition, Hong Kong University Museum and Art Gallery, 15 March – 24 May 1997. Organized in association with the Henan Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology. Catalogue. Hong Kong 1997, pp. 28 – 29, nos. 56, 57, 98; see also Henan gu dai ci yao (The Ancient Kilns of Henan Province). Taibei, 2002, colorpls. pp. 190, 191, 196, 198, 199.
4. For a discussion of this debate, see Kerr, Rose, and Nigel Wood. 2004 Chemistry and Chemical Technology. Pt. 12, Ceramic Technology, edited by Rose Kerr. Vol. 5 of Science and Civilisation in China by Joseph Needham. Cambridge, 2004, p. 441, no. 171. See also Robert D. Mowry in Harvard’s Art Museums: 100 Years of Collecting. With contributions by James Cuno et al., Cambridge, Mass., 1996, pp. 58 – 59.
5. Sinan haejˇo yumul (Cultural Relics from the Sinan Coast). Edited by Munhwa Kongbobu Munhwajae Kwalliguk. 3 vols. Seoul, 1981 – 85, vol. 1 (1981), colorpls. 136, 137, pls. 345, 348, 349. The Sinan Jun-type tripodal bulb bowls, which are decorated with bosses, bear some resemblance to the Lehman “Numbered Jun” piece, as well as to some Yuan dynasty Longquan celadon-glazed bulb bowls found in the same wreck (Sinan 1981 – 85, vol. 1 [1981], colorpls. 86, 87, pls. 275, 276). It has been established that these Sinan Jun-type bulb bowls and flowerpots were manufactured at the Tiedian kilns in the vicinity of Jinhua, Zhejiang Province. See Feng Xianming. “Problems Concerning Ceramics Found off the Sinan Coast.” In Shinan kaitei hikiage bunbutsu: Report of International Symposium on Cultural Relics Found off Sinan Coast, p. vi (English summary), pp. 29 – 30. Symposium held 8 – 11 September 1983 at the Aichi Trade Center, Nagoya. Tokyo, 1984, pp. 29 – 30 (English summary, p. vi). See also Ye Peilan. Yuan dai ciqi (Yuan Dynasty Porcelains). Beijing, 1998, pp. 293 – 94.
6. Feng Xianming. “Problems Concerning Ceramics Found off the Sinan Coast.” In Shinan kaitei hikiage bunbutsu: Report of International Symposium on Cultural Relics Found off Sinan Coast, p. vi (English summary), pp. 29 – 30. Symposium held 8 – 11 September 1983 at the Aichi Trade Center, Nagoya. Tokyo, 1984, p. 29 and fig. 5.
7. Li Minju. “Chenshe lei Jun yao ciqi niandai kao bian” (Investigating the Age of Various Categories of Jun-Ware Porcelains). Kaogu xue yanjiu, 1997, no. 3, pp. 138 – 45; Chen Kelun. “Juntai yao: ‘Bei Song Jun yao’ chanpin shidai de zai tantao” (A Discussion about the Dating of Juntai Ware and Northern Song Jun Ware). Shanghai Bowuguan ji kan, 2005, no. 10, pp. 168 – 78; Liu Minghua. “Juntai guan Jun ci shao zao shidai kaozheng” (Research of the Date of Manufacture of the Juntai Imperial Jun Porcelains). In 2005 Zhongguo Yuzhou Jun yao xueshu yantao hui lun wenji (Collected Works from the 2005 Congress on the Jun Kilns at Yuzhou, China), edited by Henan Sheng Wenwu Kaogu Yanjiusuo and Yuzhou Jun Guan Yaozhi Bowuguan, pp. 71 – 85. Zhengzhou, 2007..
8. See notes 2, 3 above.
9. See Guo Peiyu. “Yuzhou Juntai yaozhi xin faxian” (New Discoveries at the Juntai Kiln-Site, Yuzhou). Wenwu tiandi, 2005, no. 6, p. 49, where they are attributed to the Song dynasty.
10. Guo Peiyu. “Yuzhou Juntai yao kaogu xin faxian yu chubu yanjiu” (Preliminary Research on the New Archaeological Discoveries at the Juntai Kilns at Yuzhou). In 2005 Zhongguo Yuzhou Jun yao xueshu yantao hui lun wenji (Collected Works from the 2005 Congress on the Jun Kilns at Yuzhou, China), edited by Henan Sheng Wenwu Kaogu Yanjiusuo and Yuzhou Jun Guan Yaozhi Bowuguan, pp. 44 – 50. Zhengzhou, 2007, colorpl. 7.
11. Ibid., colorpl. 8.
12. Liu Minghua. “Juntai guan Jun ci shao zao shidai kaozheng” (Research of the Date of Manufacture of the Juntai Imperial Jun Porcelains). In 2005 Zhongguo Yuzhou Jun yao xueshu yantao hui lun wenji (Collected Works from the 2005 Congress on the Jun Kilns at Yuzhou, China), edited by Henan Sheng Wenwu Kaogu Yanjiusuo and Yuzhou Jun Guan Yaozhi Bowuguan, pp. 71 – 85. Zhengzhou, 2007.
13. Chen Kelun. “Juntai yao: ‘Bei Song Jun yao’ chanpin shidai de zai tantao” (A Discussion about the Dating of Juntai Ware and Northern Song Jun Ware). Shanghai Bowuguan ji kan, 2005, no. 10, pp. 168 – 78.

[Ton-Ying & Company]; Ton-Ying sale, American Art Association, Anderson Galleries, New York, 24-25 January 1930, lot 281, ill. Acquired by Robert Lehman from the Ton-Ying sale.