This vessel was shaped on a wheel and its green glaze achieved when wood ash melted and fused onto the body during firing. It could have been a medicine jar, but more likely was intended as a cinerary urn, an inexpensive substitute for a gilt-bronze container for ashes. The high rim was designed to hold a straight-sided lid.
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Artwork Details
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須恵器 甕
Title:Urn
Period:Nara period (710–794)
Date:8th century
Culture:Japan
Medium:Stoneware with natural ash glaze (Sue ware)
Dimensions:H. 9 in. (22.9 cm); Diam. 10 3/4 in. (27.3 cm); Diam. of rim 6 1/8 in. (15.6 cm); Diam. of foot 5 3/4 in. (14.6 cm)
Classification:Ceramics
Credit Line:The Harry G. C. Packard Collection of Asian Art, Gift of Harry G. C. Packard, and Purchase, Fletcher, Rogers, Harris Brisbane Dick, and Louis V. Bell Funds, Joseph Pulitzer Bequest, and The Annenberg Fund Inc. Gift, 1975
Object Number:1975.268.424
[ Harry G. C. Packard American, Tokyo, until 1975; donated and sold to MMA].
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Arts of Japan," 1998.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Art in Early Japan," 1999–2000.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Blossoms of Many Colors: A Selection from the Permanent Collection of Japanese Art," March 21–August 9, 2000.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Arts of Japan," August 19, 2000–February 5, 2001.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Enlightening Pursuits," February 28–August 5, 2001.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Graceful Gestures: A Decade of Collecting Japanese Art," September 29, 2001–March 10, 2002.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "A Sense of Place: Landscape in Japanese Art," May 8–September 8, 2002.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Masterpieces from the Permanent Collection," July 2–November 29, 2005.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "A Sensitivity to the Seasons: Spring and Summer," December 17, 2005–June 4, 2006.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "A Sensitivity to the Seasons: Autumn and Winter," June 22–September 10, 2006.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Five Thousand Years of Japanese Art: Treasures from the Packard Collection," December 17, 2009–June 10, 2010.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Kyoto: Capital of Artistic Imagination," July 24, 2019–January 31, 2021.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Japan: A History of Style," March 8, 2021–April 24, 2022.
Meech, Julia -Pekarik, Suzanne G. Valenstein, and Marilyn Jenkins-Madina. Oriental Ceramics: The World's Great Collections: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. vol. 11, Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1982, p. 177, color pl. 82.
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The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world.
