Lot 250. A small white glazed rabbit, Tang Dynasty (618-907). Width 2.6 cm, 1 in. Lot sold: £2,520   (Estimate: £2,000 - 3,000). © 2022 Sotheby's.

Property from a Private Collection.

Provenance: Ralph M. Chait Galleries Inc., New York.
H. H. Pao Collection.

Lot 298. Two monumental pottery figures, Tang Dynasty (618-907). Height of taller 97 cm, 38⅛ in. Lot sold: £30,240 (Estimate: £15,000 - 20,000). © 2022 Sotheby's.

Property from a European Private Collection.

Note: The dating of this lot is consistent with the results of thermoluminescence tests, Oxford authentication Ltd., nos C101k36 and C101h4.

Lot 300. A rare sancai-glazed pedestal inkstone, Tang Dynasty (618-907). Width 16.5 cm, 6½ in. Lot sold: £56,700 (Estimate: £3,000 - 5,000). © 2022 Sotheby's.

Provenance: Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Jack Chia.
Offered at Sotheby's Hong Kong, 5th November 1996, lot 662.
Eskenazi Ltd., London, no. 9014.

The dating of this lot is consistent with the result of a thermoluminescence test, Oxford authentication Ltd., no. 266r60.

Lot 301. A sancai-glazed 'phoenix and equestrian' ewer, Tang Dynasty (618-907). Height 33 cm, 13 in. Lot sold: £52,920 (Estimate: £10,000 - 15,000). © 2022 Sotheby's.

Provenance: Sotheby's London, 2nd March 1971, lot 119.
The Toguri Collection.
Eskenazi Ltd., London, no. 9014.

Note: Modelled in the form of a Sasanian metal ewer and applied with Hellenistic-inspired decoration, this ewer embodies the commercial and cultural exchange that characterises the art of the early Tang dynasty. Margaret Medley in Metalwork and Chinese Ceramics, London, 1972 (p. 4), discusses the far-reaching effect on Tang potters of the opening of diplomatic relations between the Chinese Emperor Yangdi of the Sui dynasty (581-618) and the Sasanian Persian Empire (224-651), which led to the exchange of tributary gifts as well as the arrival of Persian craftsmen at the Imperial court in the Tang capital Chang'an (today's Xi'an, Shaanxi).

Compare two ewers of this model included in the Illustrated Catalogues of Tokyo National Museum: Chinese Ceramics, vol. I, Tokyo, 1988, pls. 220 and 221; and another in the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, illustrated in The World's Great Collections: Oriental Ceramics, vol. 8, Tokyo, 1982, pl. 23.

Sotheby's. Monochrome, London, 2 November 2022