Eastern Han Dynasty Glazed Pottery Incense Burner
Boshan incense burner was popular in the Western Han Dynasty. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, it gradually changed to a style with mythical beasts or various scenes on the mountain.
The base is a tiger biting the pillar of the tray, and the lid is a complex scene. On the top, a tiger is biting another tiger. On the right side of the bottom, a person or a god with bent legs is holding his head with his left hand and holding a big axe in his right hand ready to chop it down.
There is a snake above the cow, and there is another tiger's retreat on the cow. The whole picture is a bit like a three-dimensional Spring and Autumn bronze decoration. One bites another, forming a common picture, but all people and animals are very vivid and vivid in both expression and posture.
At least it is a craftsman from 1,800 years ago, and its depiction ability is amazing.
Boshan incense burner, also known as Boshan incense burner, Boshan incense burner, etc., is mostly made of bronze and ceramics. It appeared in the middle of the Western Han Dynasty and was a common incense burning utensil in the Han and Jin dynasties in China. There is a cover on the furnace body, which is generally hollow and high and pointed, like a mountain; there are beasts and birds carved in the mountain, symbolizing Boshan, one of the three sea fairy mountains (Penglai, Boshan, Yingzhou) in the legend of the Western Han Dynasty, so the "Boshan furnace" got its name. Another theory is that the "Boshan furnace" got its name from its place of origin. Boshan refers to the Boshan area in Boshan District, Zibo City, Shandong Province (formerly known as "Yanshen Town"), which was an important ceramic production area in ancient my country.
The emergence of Boshan furnace is related to the prevalence of Taoist thought in the Western Han Dynasty. When the incense burns, green smoke emanates from the hollow mountain relief, and the fairy air lingers, as if you are in a fairyland. Li Bai's poem "Yang Pan'er" in the Tang Dynasty says: "The agarwood fire in the Boshan furnace, the double smoke rises to the purple clouds." It describes the charming artistic conception of the incense filling the Boshan furnace when the incense is lit. The popularity of Boshan furnace was based on the ancient people's pursuit of immortality or becoming an immortal after death, and reflected the general admiration of Taoism in society at that time.
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