The bottle-shaped thin bottom is full of circles, so it is named because the mouth is small and only plum branches can be inserted. Because the bottle body is slender, it was called "Beijing bottle" in Song Dynasty, which was used as a wine container with beautiful and handsome shape. After the Ming dynasty, it was called plum bottle.
Plum bottles first appeared in the Tang Dynasty and were popular in the Song and Liao Dynasties, and many new varieties appeared. Porcelain kilns were fired in the Song and Yuan Dynasties, and Jingdezhen blue-and-white plum bottles were the most exquisite in the Yuan Dynasty. Its superb firing skills and immortal artistic value have condensed the wisdom and art of the ancient Han working people.
Main applications
(1) wine storage device
With regard to the use of plum bottles, we can know from literature records, handed down objects and ancient paintings that plum bottles should be practical at first, mostly used for holding wine or other liquid substances. Its function continued until the Yuan and Ming Dynasties. The use of plum bottles as wine vessels is reflected in many inscriptions on plum bottles. For example, the Shanghai Museum has two plum blossom bottles from Cizhou Kiln in the Song Dynasty, with white and black flowers, one with the words "sake" written on the abdomen and the other with the words "drunken wine sea" written on the abdomen.
In addition, there are other inscriptions that reflect the basic functions of plum bottles from the side. For example, there is a Tao Mei bottle unearthed from the local folk kiln in the Ming tomb in Guilin Museum, and the word "Forever" is engraved on the shoulder of the bottle. "Forever and ever" itself has the meaning of blessing, but also implies the harmonious meaning of "Tianzang wine", which shows its dual functions of blessing and wine storage.
(2) Display and appreciation
With the development of society, plum bottles gradually have the function of display and decoration, and even plum bottles are often buried as funerary objects, as evidenced by a large number of Ming Dynasty plum bottles unearthed in Fanwangling District of Guilin City. These plum blossom vases have become the symbol of the hierarchical status of the upper rulers and the symbol of the meaning of "Feng Shui".
After the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the ornamental function of plum bottles became more and more obvious. Plum bottles were handed down from generation to generation in Qing dynasty, which should be related to the fact that plum bottles were mainly used for display and decoration at this time.