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Ginger jar with turned, domed wooden cover. Hard-paste porcelain painted in underglaze blue. The ovoid body tapers towards the slightly countersunk, unglazed base and is painted with magpies (?) flying amongst bamboo, peony and rocks. The neck is unglazed.
History note: Purchased from Eastwood & Holt, October 1923, for £3.15s.0d; Henry Scipio Reitlinger (d. 1950); the Reitlinger Trust, Maidenhead, from which transferred in 1991.
Bequeathed by H.S. Reitlinger, 1950; transferred from the Reitlinger Trust, 1991.
Diameter: 23 cm
Height: 27.8 cm
Method of acquisition: Bequeathed (1950) by Reitlinger, Henry Scipio
Ming
17th Century#
Circa
1600
CE
-
1644
CE
Label text from the exhibition ‘Feast and Fast: The Art of Food in Europe, 1500–1800’, on display at The Fitzwilliam Museum from 26 November 2019 until 31 August 2020: Baluster vase (‘ginger jar’)with birds, peonies and bamboo, and cover Bulbous containers like this are traditionally called ‘ginger jars’. Made in China, their porcelain bodies and lids were painted with various decorations, including birds and flowers as seen here, under-glaze in blue. From the late eighteenth century, it became fashionable to display them. However, it is not clear whether they actually ever stored ginger. While too large to store powdered ginger, they could have been made to export the root preserved in syrup.
Decoration
composed of
enamel
( blue)
Cover
composed of
wood (plant material)
Jar
Height 26.3 cm
except neck and base
Glaze
Hard-paste porcelain
Inscription present: rectangular with red border
Inscription present: serrated, white, round
Accession number: C.710 & A-1991
Primary reference Number: 21215
Old object number: CHICER/257
Stable URI
Owner or interested party:
The Fitzwilliam Museum
Associated department:
Applied Arts
This record can be cited in the Harvard Bibliographic style using the text below:
The Fitzwilliam Museum (2024) "Jar" Web page available at: https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/21215 Accessed: 2024-12-23 05:49:44
To cite this record on Wikipedia you can use this code snippet:
{{cite web|url=https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/21215
|title=Jar
|author=The Fitzwilliam Museum|accessdate=2024-12-23 05:49:44|publisher=The
University of Cambridge}}
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/objects/object-21215
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/aa8/C_710_20_26_20A_1991_281_29.jpg"
alt="Jar"
class="img-fluid" />
<figcaption class="figure-caption text-info">Jar</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
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