Covered jar with melon-shaped finial

Covered wares for foods or cosmetics increased in popularity from the Han dynasty onward. The melon-shaped knob emerged in the southeastern and south central areas during the third century and survived for hundreds of years. Beginning in the fourth century, the application of overglaze brown spots on celadon wares spread from Jiangsu-Zhejiang into the adjacent areas of Jiangxi, Anhui, and Fujian. This significant piece carries both the melon-shaped knob and the decorative brown spots, a contribution of the early Eastern Jin period (KG 1986.5: 419; WW 1981.12: 6; WWZLCK 1983 vol. 8: 17-8, 39).