Flared base with rounded food storage bowl on top. The base is cut with evenly spaced rectangular holes. The lid is incised with a repeating herringbone, or dotted design. The know on the lid is the shape of a Buddhist canopy, or chattra.
Subject Matter
It would be Used for food storage or funerals.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
Following the Chinese imports of the climbing kiln and the fast wheel, potters of Gaya and Silla in the fifth to the sixth century turned out tens of thousands of high-quality, thin-walled, stoneware pedestal food vessels like these. These two examples retained their original lids. One lid is surmounted by a Buddhist chattra (a canopy-shaped knob) and decorated with a herringbone pattern of small incised dots. The other has a button-shaped knob and is decorated with incised saw-toothed patterns and stamped bands of circles. Although they were also used in elite households, such pedestal bowls have survived in large numbers because they were buried with the deceased.
The incised and stamped designs on these vessels are thought to derive from cast-bronze artifacts. The shape is likely based on a Chinese bronze vessel known as a dou, which was probably transmitted to the Three Kingdoms through pottery examples in Manchuria and the Chinese colony of Luolan in northern Korea. Bowls of the same shape and pattern have also been found in tombs near present-day Osaka in Japan: the Yamato clans who ruled during the Tumulus Period (300–552) in Japan were close relatives of the Gaya people, who were conquered by Silla in 562.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
Flared base with rounded food storage bowl on top. The base is cut with evenly spaced rectangular holes. The lid is incised with a repeating herringbone, or dotted design. The know on the lid is the shape of a Buddhist canopy, or chattra.
Subject Matter
It would be Used for food storage or funerals.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
Following the Chinese imports of the climbing kiln and the fast wheel, potters of Gaya and Silla in the fifth to the sixth century turned out tens of thousands of high-quality, thin-walled, stoneware pedestal food vessels like these. These two examples retained their original lids. One lid is surmounted by a Buddhist chattra (a canopy-shaped knob) and decorated with a herringbone pattern of small incised dots. The other has a button-shaped knob and is decorated with incised saw-toothed patterns and stamped bands of circles. Although they were also used in elite households, such pedestal bowls have survived in large numbers because they were buried with the deceased.
The incised and stamped designs on these vessels are thought to derive from cast-bronze artifacts. The shape is likely based on a Chinese bronze vessel known as a dou, which was probably transmitted to the Three Kingdoms through pottery examples in Manchuria and the Chinese colony of Luolan in northern Korea. Bowls of the same shape and pattern have also been found in tombs near present-day Osaka in Japan: the Yamato clans who ruled during the Tumulus Period (300–552) in Japan were close relatives of the Gaya people, who were conquered by Silla in 562.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
Tall hourglass-shaped stand. Composed of three separate parts: two bowls and a connecting cylinder. The pieces are unified with appliquéd bands encircling the cylinder horizontally as well as evenly spaced cut-out shapes of rectangles and triangles leading up the stand vertically in lines.
Subject Matter
Possibly for Shamanistic rituals or funeral offerings.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
This hourglass-shaped stand is assembled from three separately thrown pieces: a bowl on top linked to a larger bowl on the bottom by a cylindrical form in the middle. The complex form is unified by the vertically aligned rectangular and triangular cutouts and repeating patterns of horizontal ridges. Such architectonic stands can reach forty-five to fifty centimeters in height and originally supported round-bottomed jars similar to the ones in this case. The stands’ impressive height and eye-catching designs made them ideal vessels for funerary offerings. Similar stands have been excavated from Gaya tombs, but the same vessel type and design was also made in the neighboring kingdom of Silla. Tall ceremonial stands were made in Baekje as well and have also been found in Kyushu in southern Japan, attesting to the links between the Korean peninsula and the Japanese archipelago from the fifth to the sixth century.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
A sturdy, well-potted stoneware jar, with a spherical bottom, a sharply angled shoulder, and a wide slightly flaring mouth. The decoration consists of four bands of combed wavy lines: one at the waist, one at the shoulder, and two on the neck. The neck bands are bordered by three ridges, a double ridge topmost.
Subject Matter
Two types of stoneware jars were made in Silla. Short-necked jars were used to store grain or liquid, while long-necked jars, often with a pierced stand, were used for ceremonies and placed in the tomb with the dead. Burial chamber were filled with such pieces, which were meant to serve the dead in the afterlife. A great deal of our understanding about the material culture of Silla comes from such burial goods.
Archaeological evidence indicates that this ceramic type was first developed in the Kaya region, and subsequently adopted in Silla. While earlier coil-built pottery was uneven and restricted in form, the Kaya-Silla wares were thrown on a fast wheel giving them thin, and even walls. They were fired at high temperature (about 800°C), in efficient, large single-chambered kilns, which made them tough and non-porous.
During the firing process, ash from the burning wood would sometimes melt onto the clay body, forming a natural glaze. Korean potters soon took advantage of this and would regularly shake the firewood to encourage the ash to disperse and fall onto the body of the pot. Many long-necked jars show traces of this natural glaze.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
A close look reveals the skill and complexity of this jar, which is divided into three sections—body, shoulder, and neck—by sharp, angular changes to the outer contour. The body and shoulder sections both feature a band of wavy combed patterns. The neck section is decorated with two bands of wavy combed patterns between bands of raised lines. The potting and decoration are carefully controlled and precise. This pot would have been thrown on a fast wheel, probably by a skilled and experienced potter—an indication of a stratified society of elite consumers and specialized laborers that prevailed in each of the Three Kingdoms.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
Thin-walled jar consisting of a base, globular body, and flaring neck. The piece is decorated with a bubbled design, and the base has evenly spaced rectangular cutouts. The body is incised with two narrow bands of combed wavy patterns that lay just below sets of two indented lines.
Subject Matter
Used in funerary rituals to offer food to the deceased.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
This thin-walled jar attests to the skill of the Silla potter working in the thriving industry of mortuary ceramics during the Three Kingdoms period. Each component—the flaring neck, the globular body, and the base—was made separately and then joined together. The cutouts in the low pedestal base were made when the clay was partially hardened. Two narrow bands of wavy combed patterns and a few raised lines decorate the body, which is made of sandy fine clay marked by air bubbles, adding an attractive surface texture. Archeological findings suggest that this vessel type was used in funerary rituals to hold food offerings for the deceased.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
Flaring base with spherical food storage bowl on top. The base is cut with evenly spaced rectangular holes. The lid is incised with a repeating design.
Subject Matter
Food vessel.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
Following the Chinese imports of the climbing kiln and the fast wheel, potters of Gaya and Silla in the fifth to the sixth century turned out tens of thousands of high-quality, thin-walled, stoneware pedestal food vessels like these. These two examples retained their original lids. One lid is surmounted by a Buddhist chattra (a canopy-shaped knob) and decorated with a herringbone pattern of small incised dots. The other has a button-shaped knob and is decorated with incised saw-toothed patterns and stamped bands of circles. Although they were also used in elite households, such pedestal bowls have survived in large numbers because they were buried with the deceased.
The incised and stamped designs on these vessels are thought to derive from cast-bronze artifacts. The shape is likely based on a Chinese bronze vessel known as a dou, which was probably transmitted to the Three Kingdoms through pottery examples in Manchuria and the Chinese colony of Luolan in northern Korea. Bowls of the same shape and pattern have also been found in tombs near present-day Osaka in Japan: the Yamato clans who ruled during the Tumulus Period (300–552) in Japan were close relatives of the Gaya people, who were conquered by Silla in 562.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
Earthenware roof tile-end with molded lotus design.
Subject Matter
Lotus with thirteen petals.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
Two types of tiles were used in the construction of traditional ceramic roof structures in Korea. One type, called ammaksae, was flat with a slight curve in the cross-section. It was placed concave side up, directly on top of the roof supports. The other type, called sumaksae, was semicylindrical and placed convex side up to cover the joined edges of the flat ammaksae tiles. When completely in place on a roof, ammaksae tiles alternated with rows of sumaksae. Rain rolled off the curved spine of the sumaksae rows and ran down the gutters formed by the ammaksae tiles. The terminal ends of both the ammaksae and sumaksae rows were capped by tile-ends, which were usually decorated and visible on the edge of the eaves. A crescent-shaped tile-end capped the ammaksae row, while a round tile-end capped the end-tile on a sumaksae row.
The Buddhist lotus, readily adapted into a medallion shape, became the favored motif for decorating sumaksae end-tiles after Korea’s adoption of Buddhism in the fourth century. At first the lotus medallion was simple: the seedpod contained few seeds, the petals were few, and their forms were wide and fleshy. Toward the end of the Three Kingdoms period, the lotus design became more complex and linear and the petals more narrow and flat. In the Unified Silla period that followed, other floral medallions were introduced. The lotus often appeared in combination with a bosanghwa (precious visage) motif, a stylized floral pattern that symbolized the sanctity of Buddhism. The bosanghwa motif on these tiles appears as a stylized heart shape outside the central lotus and could easily be mistaken for a yeoui (scepter-head) pattern, another Buddhist-derived motif. Thousands of these Unified Silla circular tile-ends have been unearthed at the Pond of Geese and Ducks (Anapji), a man-made water feature that was part of a large-scale pleasure resort in Gyeongju, the Silla capital.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
Jar with a round base, short neck and flaring mouth. Fabric imprints and gently indented lines stretch across the round body of the jar.
Subject Matter
The grayish-blue stoneware is one of the earthenware of the Iron ages. Its clay is similar to that of the reddish brown earthenware. But Its hardness is harder. The design is usually cross stripes or check. It was almost excavated in the Iron age’s shell mounds of the southern coast of the Korea.
Label Copy
March 28, 2009
The earliest Korean earthenware was hand built. After forming the vessel from clay coils, the potter consolidated them by beating a wooden paddle against the outer wall, supported inside by a wooden anvil. With the introduction of the potter’s wheel toward the end of the Iron Age (circa 300 BCE–300 CE), it was possible to form pots on a slow wheel and finish with the paddle-and-anvil process to compact the vessel wall. Sometimes the potter wrapped his paddle with a jute-like fabric to create distinctive textures on the vessel’s surface, as on this example. Storage jars of this shape—with round bases, short necks, and slightly flaring mouths—are common among wares of the third through the fifth century.
(Label for UMMA Korean Gallery Opening Rotation, March 2009)
If you are interested in using an image for a publication, please fax a request to the attention of Orian Neumann, Assistant Registrar, at 734-474-7643. For other queries, email orian@umich.edu.edu.
