Longquan Celadon Lidded Meiping Vase with Ribbed Pattern Decoration
This vase is also known as a Taibai vase or a Jing vase. The lid is cup-shaped and the main body has a small opening, with an outward extending rim, short neck, curved shoulders, a deep rounded belly tapering downwards, a circular base, and is covered with a ribbed pattern design. The green gray glaze is transparent and on parts of the belly is decorated with cracks of different sizes and yellowish.
Theglaze is smooth and lustrous, with clear signs that it was applied on two separate occasions, providing evidence of the development from one to multiple layers of glaze on ceramic vessels. This Meiping vase was unearthed at the same time as several similar vases were discovered from the first year of the reign of Emperor Qingyuan (Song Ningzong) in the Southern Song dynasty (1195) in Hengshan Village, Shuinan Rural Township, Xiping Town, Songyang County, Zhejiang Province. During the Song dynasty (960-1279) and Yuan dynasty (1271-1368), Meiping vases were mass produced by kilns in both north and south China, though in terms of elegance and refinement nothing compares to the Longquan green-gray glaze Meiping vases of the Southern Song dynasty. This category of vessels was called Meiping vases because of their “small rim diameter and thinness of plum blossoms branches.” However, this exquisite name was completely unrelated to the function of the vessel, as it was used to store wine rather than hold flowers.