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Description

A globular jar with a relatively wide mouth, short neck, relatively narrow flat base and four horizontal lugs on the shoulder. The body is decorated with four panels in low relief. Each panel design consists of a dragon enclosed by a border of spheres and flowers. The shoulder has a series of concentric circles in a darker underglazed brown. The lip has a set of inked numbers.

History Of Use

This jar was probably exported from Vietnam to the Philippines via the Burmese port of Martaban from which the generic name for large jars is derived. They are also referred to as dragon jars because they often have a moulded dragon decoration on their sides. These pot-bellied jars were designed for long journeys at sea, with lugs big enough to pass a rope through and as containers for food, oil and water as well as for packing smaller porcelains. While dragon jars were mainly manufactured in the kilns of southern China as trade items during the song and Ming dynasties, they were also manufactured in other parts of Southeast Asia such as Burma, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam and are still being manufactured today in parts of Asia due to their physical characteristics - resonance, vitreosity and durability - ceramics became fully integrated with the ideology and ritual in Philippine societies and played an important role in all aspects of cultural life (Langrick, p.61). Their functions were varied and included utilitarian, ceremonial, religious roles, as heirlooms, in mortuary ceremonies as burial goods and as items of prestige. Treasured for their supernatural powers, large jars were considered to harbour spirits or household gods while some spoke prophesying events. As heirlooms, large jars together with stories of their origins and other tales associated with them, often mythical and wondrous, were handed down from one generation to another. With age, jars increased in value and one's wealth was largely reflected in the number of old jars possessed.

Narrative

An heirloom piece, defined by Dr. Tecson as one never in the ground, hence different from an excavated piece, and not necessarily from his family. This piece is from Zamboanga del Sur, Mindanao Island, Philippines.

Specific Techniques

Probably hand-built with clay rings of varying sizes. These were fused together by holding a mallet with a convex face against the inside surface of the jar and tapping gently with a concave mallet held against the outer surface.

Cultural Context

exchange; status; ceremonial; heirloom.

Iconographic Meaning

In many indigenous groups of the Philippines, supernatural power was attributed to Chinese ceramics because of the ringing sound emitted when lightly tapped and their vitreous, shiny glazed surfaces which impart an impermeable quality. The ringing sound was seen as a magical voice able to attract the attention of powerful ancestor spirits. Their impermeable and seemingly imperishable surfaces were believed to have great protective power against all kinds of influences, from evil spirits to poisons (Langrick, p. 55-56). It is probable that Vietnamese ceramic wares were also associated with these qualities. According to Langrick, the country of origin of these wares were not important and distinctions were not made between Chinese, Sawankhalok (Thai), Annamese (Vietnamese), Cambodian or native pottery. Whatever distinctions were made concerned only their actual serviceability for the ritual being performed (p. 258). The dragon is associated with the mythical Naga serpent by the people.

Item History

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