Pedestal Covered Box

15th–16th century

Medium/TechniqueStoneware with black glaze; carved decoration

DimensionsOverall: 6.5 x 7.4 cm (2 9/16 x 2 15/16 in.)

Credit LineBequest of John D. Constable

Accession number2018.2131a-b

On View

Not on view

ClassificationsCeramics

Collections

Asia

ProvenanceBy 1948, Ngo Quynh Dieu, Ris-Orangis, Essone, France; by descent to her daughter, Nguyen Guynh Anh (Mrs. Nguyen Phuoc Dai, b. 1924 – d. after 2000), Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam [see note 1]; between about 1978 and 2000, given or sold by Mme. Dai to John Davidson Constable (b. 1927 - d. 2016), Sherborn, MA; 2017, bequest of John Davidson Constable to the MFA [2]. (Accession Date: September 26, 2018)

NOTES:
[1] According to a signed attestation from Mme. Dai, she received her Vietnamese ceramics from her mother, who kept the collection in France beginning in 1948. According to Andrew Ranard, “Madame Dai’s: Past Is Present in Ho Chi Minh City,” New York Times, September 10, 1993, Mme. Dai kept part of her “family collection” at her restaurant in Ho Chi Minh; her grandfather had been a collector, and she began to sell pieces from this collection off beginning in 1975.
[2] From 2005 to 2006, on loan to the MFA.