A rare incised white-glazed 'monk's cap' ewer Ming dynasty, Yongle period | 明永樂 甜白釉暗花纏枝蓮八吉祥紋僧帽壺

Sotheby's Hong Kong, 15th May 1990, lot 38.

香港蘇富比1990年5月15日，編號38

Sotheby's Hong Kong – Twenty Years, Hong Kong, 1993, pl. 136.

《香港蘇富比二十週年》，香港，1993年，圖版136

Porcelain ewers of this form appear to have been produced since the Yuan dynasty and became a standard vessel shape of the imperial kilns in the Yongle reign. This type of white-glazed ewers was made for Tibetan Buddhist rituals performed either at court in the then capital, Nanjing, or in Tibet proper. The Emperor actively supported Tibetan Buddhism, and in 1407 he invited the most influential lama Halima (1384-1415) to the capital Nanjing to perform religious services for his deceased parents. Halima, bestowed with the title Dabao Fawang (Great Precious Religious Ruler) by the Emperor, was the Tibetan religious leader of the Karma-pa sect. The Emperor commissioned lavish gifts from the imperial workshops for this occasion.

More than fifty porcelain ewers of this form, either incised or undecorated, were recovered from stratum five of the Yongle waste heaps of the Ming imperial kilns site, believed to date from around 1407. See a fragmentary monk's cap ewer incised with lingzhi and floral scrolls published in Imperial Hongwu and Yongle Porcelain excavated at Jingdezhen, Chang Foundation, Taipei, 1996, cat. no. 99; and another in the Tibet Museum, Lhasa, illustrated in Treasures from Snow Mountain. Gems of Tibetan Cultural Relics, Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, 2001, cat. no. 88.

Yongle ewers with similar incised designs are in the British Museum, London, illustrated in Jessica Harrison-Hall, Ming Ceramics, London, 2001, p. 98, pl. 3:2, where the author explains that 'vessels of this shape are known as monk's cap ewers, possibly because the lip and spout of the ewer resemble the stepped profile of the yellow hat of a Tibetan lamaist monk; and in the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, from the collection of H.M. King Gustaf VI Adolf of Sweden published in The World's Great Collections. Chinese Ceramics, vol. 8, Tokyo, 1982, pl. 207. An ewer of this type, but without the anhua decoration, from the Qing court collection and still in the Palace Museum, Beijing, is published in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Monochrome Porcelain, Hong Kong, 1999, pl. 100.

Yongle monk's cap ewers have also been sold at auction, see a bajixiang-decorated example, sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 29th May 2007, lot 1479; another example with bajixiang, but engraved with a reign mark, sold in these rooms, 31st October 1995, lot 357; and a plain ewer, formerly in the collection of Shah Jahan of India, sold in our London rooms, 7th November 2012, lot 318.

'Monk’s cap' ewers derive their shape from Tibetan ewers made of metal or wood, which were probably placed in front of altars filled with provisions or with water for use in ablutions, as is suggested in a somewhat later Tibetan painted textile depicting Avalokiteshvara and other deities behind an altar set with bowls of fruit, a flower vase, pear-shaped bottles and a monk’s cap ewer, illustrated in Defining Yongle. Imperial Art in Early Fifteenth-Century China, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2005, cat. no. 36.

For a white Yuan prototype of this form but of different proportions, excavated from a tomb in Haidian district, Beijing, and now in the Capital Museum, Beijing, see Zhongguo taoci quanji [Complete series on Chinese ceramics], Shanghai, 1999-2000, vol. 11, pl. 62.

僧帽壺始燒於元代，至明永樂一朝，因明成祖朱棣極力扶持西藏佛教，僧帽壺遂成為御窰廠經典造型。1407年，永樂帝為其先父先母祈薦冥福，邀請噶瑪噶舉派第五世活佛哈里麻（1384-1415年）於南京靈谷寺建普渡大齋，對其寵費優握，封為大寶法王，賞賜頗豐。 

明永樂御窰廠遺址第五地層出土相類僧帽壺約五十餘件，應製於1407年前後，見有素面及錐花兩種。參考一錐花例，以纏枝花卉為主，靈芝為輔，收入《景德鎮出土明初官窰瓷器》，鴻禧美術館，台北，1996年，編號99。另見拉薩西藏博物館藏例，曾展於《雪域藏珍：西藏文物精華》，上海博物館，上海，2001年，編號88。

參考倫敦大英博物館藏類同永樂錐花僧帽壺， 刊於霍吉淑，《Ming Ceramics》，倫敦，2001年，頁98，圖版3:2，作者論及「此類盛器稱『僧帽壺』，因其器頂、壺流造形彷似西藏喇嘛著戴黃帽側影。」另一例藏於斯德哥爾摩東亞博物館，原為瑞典國王古斯塔夫六世珍藏，錄於《The World's Great Collections. Chinese Ceramics》，卷8，東京，1982年，圖版207。北京故宮博物院藏一例永樂僧帽壺，無紋，原為清宮舊藏，載於《故宮博物院藏文物珍品全集．顏色釉》，香港，1999年，圖版100。

比較一件八吉祥紋作例，2007年5月29日售於香港佳士得，編號1479，還有一例也是八吉祥紋，帶錐花年款，1995年10月31日，售於香港蘇富比，編號357。還有一例素面無紋者，曾為沙賈漢收藏，2012年11月7日，售於倫敦蘇富比，編號318。

僧帽壺造型，以藏式佛教法會所用金屬或木壺為藍本，置於佛壇前方，內盛供品或裝水用以淨手，參考一幅西藏布本彩繪，年代略晚，描畫觀音諸神正前置一供台，上置供果、花瓶、梨形瓶及一件僧帽壺；參見《Defining Yongle. Imperial Art in Early Fifteenth-Century China》，大都會藝術博物館，紐約，2005年，圖版36。

參考一件元代雛本，器形比例略異，出土於北京海淀區，現藏北京首都博物館，見《中國陶瓷全集》，上海，1999-2000年，卷11，圖版62。