Box and Cover with Inlaid Chrysanthemum Design (1200s): Art, History and Details

Box and Cover with Inlaid Chrysanthemum Design (1200s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Celadons, spoons, seals, and bronze mirrors were the most common burial objects in tombs during the Goryeo period (918-1392). Once used to contain color powder, rouge and eyebrow gel for makeup, this small container was one of the standard goods that furnished elites' tombs. Goryeo-period women and men used the grain powder of rice or millet for whitening their skin, safflower extract for rouge, and plant ash or soot for eyebrow gel. Yet, natural-looking make-up seems to have been the most favorable one in Korea according to the travelogue by Xu Jing (1091-1153), the Chinese diplomat who visited Korea in 1123.

Object facts

• Title: Box and Cover with Inlaid Chrysanthemum Design
• Date: 1200s
• Culture: Korea, Goryeo dynasty (918–1392)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: celadon
• Dimensions: Diameter: 9.1 cm (3 9/16 in.); Overall: 4.2 cm (1 5/8 in.)
• Collection: Korean Art
• Department: Korean Art
• Accession number: 1918.423

A detail from the museum

This ceramic container was used to store incense or cosmetics.

Collection credit

Gift of John L. Severance

Further reading listed by the museum

• Lee, Young-hee. "The Study on Techniques and their Interrelations among Craft Arts of the Goryeo Dynasty [고려시대 공예기법 연구 상호관련성을 중심으로]." Misulsa hakbo 22 (2004): 133-170.
• A Chinese traveler in medieval Korea : Xu Jing's illustrated account of the Xuanhe embassy to Koryo. Translated by Sem Vermeersch. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2016.
• Goryeo Dynasty: Korea's Age of Enlightenment, 918-1392. San Francisco: Asian Art Museum, 2003.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.