In the brilliant stars of chenghua doucai, the chicken bowl cup is well known for its high auction price.
In terms of the degree of cherishing, there is a porcelain that can be said to be on a par with the chicken bowl cup, that is, the imperial object of the Ming Chenghua period - the Tianzi jar.
▲Ming Chenghua Doucai Sea Beast Pattern Tianzi Jar and Bottom Model
Collection of the Palace Museum
The reason why it is called "Tianzi Can" is because its bottom model is a "Tian" character.
During the Chenghua period, most of the porcelain style knowledge was inherited from the Yongle and Xuande years, basically based on the six-character calligraphy of the "Daming Chenghua Year System", and the four-character or other forms of knowledge were rare.
▲Ming Chenghua Yellow glaze dark engraving cloud dragon pattern bowl and bottom model
Collection of the Guanfu Museum
However, this period created a very special type of writing, that is, the famous "Tian" style - neither the country nor the year number, only a "tian" character.
This form of recognition often falls at the bottom of the doucai small can, which is quite special in a number of models.
Later generations then collectively referred to porcelain with such knowledge as "Tianzi jars". And because the emperors of the past mostly regarded themselves as "Tianzi", the Tianzi jar was also known as the "Tianzi Jar".
▲Ming Chenghua Doucai seawater dragon pattern Tianzi jar and bottom model
As for why there was such a thing as writing only the word "tian" in the Chenghua period. Some scholars believe that this may be related to the ancient people's habit of using the number of the "Thousand Character Text".
The "Thousand Character Text" begins with the words: "The heavens and the earth are yellow, and the universe is flooded." In the order of the back, a word represents a number, and the word "heaven" is the first number.
There is some truth to this statement. But the problem is that so far, only the "Tian" character has been found in Chenghua porcelain, and no porcelain of "Earth" and "Xuan" has been found. Therefore, the statement of the number of the "Thousand Words" may not be accurate.
▲《Makusa Senji Sentence》
Yuan Zhao Mengfu Collection of the Palace Museum
There is also a saying that the Tianzi jar was used by Emperor Xianzong of the Ming Dynasty to serve wine. The characters at the bottom of it may be related to the ancient times of "Tianmeilu" and "Tianlu Doctor".
There are many speculations in addition, but so far there is no consensus. The appearance of the Tianzi jar is still a mystery, which also makes it doubly precious.
According to the information currently available to the public, the number of Ming chenghua tianzi cans is even less than that of chenghua chicken bowl cups. There are not many surviving completes, and there are few more successful replicas in later generations.
There is such a record in the Qianlong period. In the ninth year of Qianlong, a glazed Tianzi jar was sent by the Manufacturing Office, and the instructions were transmitted: "One piece of the glazed Tianzi lid jar will be handed over to Tang Ying to supplement the glaze." If you can make up, make up for it and send it. If you can't make up, you don't have to make up, still send it. ”
It can be seen that even if there is a flawed and imperfect Tianzi jar, it is still precious.
The Guanfu Museum also has an "imperfect" Tianzi jar - "Ming Chenghua Doucai Sea Beast Pattern Tianzi Jar".
▲Ming Chenghua Doucai seahorse pattern Tianzi jar
The original utensils are mutilated, and the lid is a rear fitting.
Mr. Ma explained in a program: "[This Tianzi jar] can theoretically be restored, and our current restoration technology can repair it very perfectly." But I felt that the repair was no longer meaningful, so I came with a cover. ”
The main body of this Tianzi jar is decorated with one of the traditional Rui beast patterns, the sea beast pattern. Two red and two yellow sea beasts, with different looks, stand between the sea waves and clouds, stretching out nature.
Sea animal patterns mostly appear on porcelain, bronze, jade carvings and other utensils, some like horses, elephants, and some like lions and foxes. It is often based on rough seas.
▲Tang Dynasty Sea beast grape pattern mirror
These "sea beasts" look a lot like real animals, but they are not exactly real animals.
This is because the ancients had a great deal of imagination in depicting sea beasts, some adding fins or wings to land animals, and some combining the characteristics of two or more animals.
For example, the sea beast painted on the "Ming Chenghua Doucai Sea Beast Pattern Tianzi Jar" collected by the Guanfu Museum is a combination of the sphinx beast and the flying wing.
All kinds of colorful sea animal patterns also reflect the vigorous imagination and creativity of the ancients from the side.
Based on this [Ming Chenghua Doucai Sea Beast Pattern Tianzi Jar], guanfu museum has hand-copied a "doucai sea beast pattern tianzi jar"▼
Doucai, using the light blue and white under the glaze as the contour line, and then fill the glaze with gorgeous red, green, yellow, purple and other color materials, and enter the kiln and burn it twice at low temperature.
The two materials of underglaze blue and white and multicolored glaze "tease" each other, so that the utensils form the artistic conception of "falling leaves and lotus flowers fighting each other, red and green covering new makeup" described in the Song Dynasty, and the fun of fighting for beauty is extremely interesting.
According to literature, Doucai was founded in the Xuande period of the Ming Dynasty, and is known for its softness and elegance, and is one of the most valuable categories in the history of ceramics. Among them, the doucai of the Ming Chenghua period is particularly respected.
This piece is copied into an ancient replica of the "Doucai Sea Beast Pattern Tianzi Jar", red is bright and not impatient, yellow transparent and bright, blue is thick and light, and the color matching is flexible and harmonious.
The tank is painted with four sea beasts, painted with underglaze blue and white, and then covered with red and yellow colors, with different looks, all of which are lions with elephant heads, galloping on all four legs, two wings and flames, standing between the waves of blue and white waves.
The lid of the jar is flat and buttonless, and it is painted with raging waves and auspicious sea beasts.
The shoulders and proximity of the jar are painted with blue and white pitched double banana leaf patterns, filled with yellow color. Under the glaze at the bottom of the jar is the blue and white handwritten seal "觀" character.