Ancient Han Dynasty Pottery Pig, China (2029BKE) $395

Description

Mingqi are ancient earthenware pottery items usually made using a bivalve mould and covered with a lead glaze that fired to a dark green. The lead in the glaze often combined with tomb dampness for centuries creating a chemical reaction changing its coloring into a lustrous and iridescent green seen here. Han mingqi were ancestral offerings for tombs to appease and provide for ancestors and assure the fulfillment of filial piety, ancestor worship and their Confucian duties. Xunzi, a follower of Confucius wrote “…one adorns the dead as though they were still living, and sends them to the grave with forms symbolic of life.” Mingqi, also known as “fearsome artifacts,” “objects for the deceased,” or “brilliant artifacts,” were a form of ancestor worship and were offerings dedicated at funeral ceremonies. They included a variety of items: dishes, utensils, servants, attendants, livestock images, chars, a bed, architectural pieces and much more, as the number, variety, size and quality of pieces increased with the family’s wealth and importance as did the size of the burial space. Pigs were an important domestic animal, a crucial food source, a major object of commerce bought, sold or exchanged for a variety of products or services and their significance is confirmed by their frequent presence in tombs.