Boshanlu censer, Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE), 1st–2nd century. Earthenware with green glaze, 29.85 x 17.78 cm. The William Hood Dunwoody Fund, 32.54.5a, b © Minneapolis Institute of Art 

Censers were common to altar tables where special incenses were burned in a variety of rituals. Those made in the form of a sacred mountain like this one may have had Daoist connotations. Made of pottery, it imitates a more expensive bronze original.