Note: Although Northern black-glazed jars of this type with lug handles are known, it is quite rare for them to retain their covers. The current jar is also very successfully fired, with its attractive, bold russet splashes beautifully set off against a dark, lustrous black ground. The distinctive decoration on this type of wares are poetically called 'partridge feather', since the spots apparently resemble the pattern on the chest of partridges, with characteristic small brownish white spots.

Compare a closely related jar in the Robert Barron Collection, which has a taller neck and more tapered lower body, illustrated in Heaven and Earth Seen Within, New Orleans Museum of Art, 2000, no. 32. Compare also two black-glazed vessels from the Falk Collection, one a baluster vase, sold at Christie's New York, 20 September 2002, lot 288; the other a covered bowl, sold at Christie's New York, 1 October 2001, lot 83.