Jar with Dragons Pursuing Flaming Jewels (1522–66): Art, History and Details

Jar with Dragons Pursuing Flaming Jewels (1522–66) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

The exterior of this jar is ornamented with two rampant five-clawed dragons boldly drawn in rouge de fer. The dragons are in pursuit of the sacred jewel amid cloud scrolls in green and yellow, flanked at the top and bottom with broad registers of cloud scrolls and gadroons. The underfoot is glazed and bears a six-character nianhao in the form of a vertical mark reading "Daming Jiajing nianzhi," enclosed in double rings in underglaze cobalt blue.

Object facts

• Title: Jar with Dragons Pursuing Flaming Jewels
• Date: 1522–66
• Culture: China, Jiangxi province, Jingdezhen kilns, Ming dynasty (1368-1644), Jiajing mark and reign (1522-66)
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: procelain with wucai (five color) overglaze enamel decoration
• Dimensions: Diameter: 14.7 cm (5 13/16 in.); Overall: 12.9 cm (5 1/16 in.)
• Collection: China - Ming Dynasty
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 1989.291

A detail from the museum

The interior is glazed white porcelain.

Collection credit

Bequest of Mrs. Severance A. Millikin

Further reading listed by the museum

• Catalogue of the Severance and Greta Millikin Collection. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1990.

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.