Small Covered Bowl with Tortoiseshell Glaze

This two-piece set includes a U-shaped bowl and a flat cover with a tiny, pierced, strap handle at the indented heart of the cover's lightly swollen center. The bowl's thin walls expand from the circular foot and then rise vertically to the lip, where they incline slightly inward. Of intermediate thickness, the flat-bottomed footring has a vertical outer wall and a lightly angled inner one; the base is broad and flat. Triangular in section, a short flange projects downward from the underside of the cover, appearing midway between the cover's center and its outer edge; a wide horizontal lip surrounds the flange. A dark brown glaze covers the bowl inside and out, excepting only the base, the bottom and inside of the footring, and the interior of the lip; the same brown glaze coats the top of the cover, including its outer edge, but excluding its underside, which is unglazed. Appearing honey-colored, transparent splashes with milky blue streaks enliven the dark brown glaze, creating a tortoiseshell effect. The exposed body clay fired off-white. The bowl and cover were wheel-thrown, as indicated by the rilling marks that appear on both, after which the footring was shaped with a knife and the cover's small handle luted into place. The glazes' order and technique of application remain uncertain; it is possible that once it had dried, the bowl was immersed in the thin slurry of caramel glaze whose edge is visible at the bottom of the footring. Following another period of drying, the bowl may have been dipped in the slurry that produced the dark glaze, after which the inside of the bowl's lip was immediately wiped free of glaze so that the cover could be fired in place. The tortoiseshell effect may then have been induced by splashing a paste of wood- or bamboo-ash mixed with water on the surface of the raw glaze. The bowl was fired right side up in its saggar, the cover in place atop the bowl. An old, Chinese, beige-fabric-covered storage box accompanies this piece.