Jar (Hu) (100 BCE–100 CE): Art, History and Details

Jar (Hu) (100 BCE–100 CE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

This superb Han dynasty jar has a robust shape imitating that of the bronze (hu) and is covered with a thin brownish-green glaze. The introduction of glazing—which provided an impervious coating to a clay body—marked a technological breakthrough in Chinese ceramic history. High-fired glazed pots were made as early as the Shang and Zhou dynasties (about 1600–256 BC). Potters gained practical technical knowledge of the reaction between the metallic oxide in the glaze and the kiln atmosphere to modify the color of a glaze.

Object facts

• Title: Jar (Hu)
• Date: 100 BCE–100 CE
• Culture: China, probably Zhejiang province, Han dynasty (202 BCE–220 CE)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: glazed stoneware with incised and applied decoration
• Dimensions: Diameter: 39.4 cm (15 1/2 in.); Overall: 45.7 cm (18 in.)
• Collection: China - Han Dynasty
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 1954.370

Collection credit

Edward L. Whittemore Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Lee, Sherman. "The Celadon Tradition." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 43, no. 3 (March 1956): 46–52.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.

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.