Jug with Walking Sphinxes

Mina’i is a modern collectors’ term for ceramics made in Iran during the late 12th to early 13th centuries. The term mina’i, translates as “enamelled” in Persian, designating the colored glass pigments used to paint detailed figural decoration on vessels or tiles, which were then fixed on the ceramic base by multiple firings. The use of a wide range of colors, including turquoise, red, green, purple, and black, also led these types of ceramics to be called by the Persian term “haft rang,” or “seven colors.”
This footed jug is a type of mina’i ware called “lavjardina,” a term derived from the Persian word for the blue stone lapis lazuli (lavjard). Rather than firing colors on a white background, lavjardina ceramics glazed color over a dark blue base. A band of sphinxes parade around the exterior of the jug and a pseudo inscription encircles the exterior rim.

Provenance

Provenance (from the French provenir, 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody, or location of a historical object. Learn more about provenance at the Walters.

Dikran Kelekian, Constantinople, New York, and Paris, [date of acquisition unknown], by purchase [as found at Rhadjes]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1914, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.