CHINA ARQUEOLOGIA golden-age-chinese-archayeolog

8
Painted pottery bo bowl
Height 5 (2), diam. 16.5 (2 1 / 2 )
Neolithic Period, Majiayao Culture
(€.3000-2500 BCE)
From Shizhaocun, Tianshui, Gansu Province
The Institute of Archaeology, CASS, Beijing
Within this small, rounded bowl 1 is the figure of
a froglike creature, who is seen from above, as
if it had been captured and put inside. The vessel
and its figural decoration are thus integral to each
other, the one serving playfully as a setting or context
for the other. The creature's back is shaped as
a broad oval containing a large circle at the center,
which is divided down the middle by three lines
into two hemispheres, filled by a dense network of
intersecting diagonal lines. The small rounded head
is almost entirely black, save for the circular eyes
and the mouth, which appear in reserve. The two
front legs, ending in three toes each, curve forward,
seeming to press against the vessel wall; the rear
legs mirror them, turning back toward each other.
The asymmetrical relationship between the oval
outline of the figure and the circular shape it contains,
as well as the fact that the oval is placed
slightly aslant in relation to the head, endows the
creature with a hint of animation. In an equally
subtle manner, the lines separating the hemispheres
of the circle follow an almost imperceptible
curve from one side to the other, producing the
effect of a dome-shaped surface. The design is
completed by multiple tangential lines painted
just beneath the rim, which converge at three equidistant
points along the wall's circumference. The
point of convergence to the right of the figure's
head is marked by a hooklike flourish. A section on
the left side of the bowl, where the frog's front foot
is located, and a smaller section on the right have
been restored.
Whether the figure at the center of the Shizhaocun
bowl is meant to be a frog or a turtle is not
entirely certain. While the round body and possibly
the head might suggest a turtle, the legs and the
three-toed feet do not. Two similar images painted
on the interior of a Banpo bowl from the Jiangzhai
site at Lintong, in Shaanxi province, are clearly
those of spotted frogs. 2
This vessel and the following guan jar (cat. 9)
were both excavated in the 19805 from the important
stratified site of Shizhaocun, near Tianshui,
located just south of the Wei River in eastern
Gansu. The site revealed six superposed strata,
documenting a sequence of cultural phases and
their associated ceramic traditions spanning
a period of three millennia, from approximately
5000 to 2000 BCE. The present bowl was recovered
from the second stratum, along with a pointedbottom
water flask decorated in the same manner
as cat. 6. Both these vessels are regarded as somewhat
older than the guan, which was unearthed
from a different location at the site. 3 LF-H
1 Excavated in 1982 (T 244.3:16); published: Zhongguo
Ganqing 1990, 577-586, pi. 1:3-4; Goepper 1995, no. 5;
Rawson 1996, no. 4.
2 See Xi'an 1988, 2: color pi. i.
3 Zhongguo Ganqing 1990, 577-586.
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