Chinese vase with elephant handles, one of a pair

An image of Vase with elephant handles. Unknown maker, China, Folk kilns. The pear-shaped vase has a slender neck, thick, rounded lip, and two elephant head and fixed-ring handles. The body tapers to a deep, flared foot with deep flat, recessed base. The elephant handles are finely painted with eyes, eyelashes, tusks and ears, and the fixed rings with single circle ornament. On each side of the body are elegant peony sprays in blue. The interior is unglazed, as is the base which is covered with a red, sandy deposit. Hard-paste porcelain, thrown, painted in underglaze blue, with base and interior unglazed. Height, whole, 24.6 cm, diameter, whole, 12.7 cm, circa 1300-1368. Yuan Dynasty (1206-1368). Collection: H.S. Reitlinger. Of a pair of vases, with C.689B-1991.

Terms of use

These images are provided for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons License (BY-NC-ND). To license a high resolution version, please contact our image library who will discuss fees, terms and waivers.

Download this image

Creative commons explained - what it means, how you can use our's and other people's content.

Vase with elephant handles. Unknown maker, China, Folk kilns. The pear-shaped vase has a slender neck, thick, rounded lip, and two elephant head and fixed-ring handles. The body tapers to a deep, flared foot with deep flat, recessed base. The elephant handles are finely painted with eyes, eyelashes, tusks and ears, and the fixed rings with single circle ornament. On each side of the body are elegant peony sprays in blue. The interior is unglazed, as is the base which is covered with a red, sandy deposit. Hard-paste porcelain, thrown, painted in underglaze blue, with base and interior unglazed. Height, whole, 24.6 cm, diameter, whole, 12.7 cm, circa 1300-1368. Yuan Dynasty (1206-1368). Collection: H.S. Reitlinger. Of a pair of vases, with C.689B-1991.

Image data

Accession Number: C.689A-1991
Photograph copyright © The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.
Aperture: f/22.0
Focal length: 120
Camera: Hasselblad H3DII-31
Photographer name: Amy Jugg
Image height: 1025 pixels
Image width: 691 pixels
Processed with: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5.0 (Windows)
Filesize: 338.70kB
Exposure time: 1/125
ISO Speed: 100
Fnumber: 22/1

Key words

14th Century AD blue blue and white ceramics Chinese elephant handles Fitz_AA floral flowers foot footed fruits glazed handle handled handles hard-paste porcelain Paeoniaceae paeony pair pear shaped pears peonies peony porcelain spray sprays studio ceramics thrown two handled two-handled underglaze vase Yuan Dynasty

Citation for print

This page can be cited in the Harvard Bibliographic style using the text below:


            The Fitzwilliam Museum (2024)
            "Chinese vase with elephant handles, one of a pair"
            Web page available at: https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/image/media-214223 Accessed: 2024-11-25 16:07:21

Citation for Wikipedia

To cite this page on Wikipedia you can use this code snippet:


            {{cite web|url=https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/image/media-214223
            |title=Chinese vase with elephant handles, one of a pair
            |author=The Fitzwilliam Museum|accessdate=2024-11-25 16:07:21|publisher=The
            University of Cambridge}}

API call for this record

To call these data via our API (remember this needs to be authenticated) you can use this code snippet:

https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/api/v1/images/media-214223

Bootstrap HTML code for reuse

To use this as a simple code embed, copy this string:

<div class="text-center">
    <figure class="figure">
        <img src="https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/imagestore/aa/aa40/C_689a_1991_1_201512_amt49_dc2.jpg"
        alt="Vase"
        class="img-fluid" />
        <figcaption class="figure-caption text-info">Chinese vase with elephant handles, one of a pair</figcaption>
    </figure>
</div>