Two thousand years before today’s “global economy,” an exchange network linked the continent of Asia via the Silk Route. Between the first and eighth centuries of the common era, the empires and states of Asia often came into conflict as they competed for territory and other resources or sought to dominate their neighbors in religious and political arenas. Yet the sea and overland routes between China and the eastern Mediterranean—the Silk Route, or Silk Road—also fostered peaceful interaction, both cultural and commercial. Merchants, ambassadors, and pilgrims transported crafted goods and raw materials acquired from distant realms: spices, precious metals, musical instruments, rare medicinal herbs, objects used in worship and ritual. Silk, the most famous of these long-distance luxuries, reached southwest Asia by the first century B.C.E. from production centers in China.
Turkey, probably Istanbul
Byzantine Empire, 500–700
Gold
Gift of Charles Lang Freer
Freer Gallery of Art, F1909.67
This medallion consists of a fourth-century gold coin set into an ornamental frame. The front of the coin bears a portrait bust depicting a Roman emperor, probably Theodosius I (reigned 379–95).
China
Tang dynasty (700–800)
Stoneware with white slip under colorless glaze
Gift of Charles Lang Freer F1909.303
China, Tang dynasty, (700–800)
Gold
Freer Gallery of Art
Purchase, F1946.20 and F1946.21
Iran
Sasanian period (250–300)
Silver and gilt
Purchase F1957.20
A few silver bowls from the Sasanian period (224–651) are decorated with portrait busts of a ruler or other high-ranking individuals. Among the earliest types of Sasanian silver vessels, they were probably inspired by Roman glass or silver vessels with portrait busts of prominent individuals.
This period, too, witnessed the expansion of Christianity, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Buddhism, and Islam over vast regions of Asia as well as Europe and Africa. Religious beliefs sometimes divided people (and empires), but they could also bring devotees together in places of pilgrimage, and they forged common ground among widely diverse cultural traditions. Leaders and followers of these great faiths often required new ways to express concepts of divinity visually, as well as appropriate settings in which to house images, enact rituals, and assemble worshipers. At Kizil (Qizil), a center of Buddhist worship and learning in northwestern China, cave temples decorated with brightly colored wall paintings and sculptures reflect sources in India, Central Asia, and China. Further west along the Silk Route, this colossal head, which once belonged to an image of a bodhisattva (enlightened being), would have been part of the sculpted tableau in a Buddhist monastery. It was made in Gandhara (present-day Afghanistan and Pakistan). Here, artists created styles of Buddhist art that combined local traditions with Greek (and later Roman) influences, which had initially been introduced with the conquests of Alexander the Great (died 323 B.C.E) in the late fourth century B.C.E.
China, Kizil (Qizil), 300–550
Gypsum plaster with pigment
23.6 cm. (H) x 50.4 cm. (W); (9 1/8 x 20 3/4 in.)
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery; long term loan from the National Museum of American Art
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; gift of John Gellatly
LTS 1985.1.325.6
Afghanistan, 300-400
Stucco with traces of paint
Height: 53 cm.
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
Gift of Arthur M. Sackler, S1987.951
Iran
Sasanian period(500–650)
Silver and gilt
Gift of Arthur M. Sackler, S1987.125
Armies and artisans, missionaries and merchants all used these routes, which also served as channels through which luxury arts created for secular and religious purposes could travel extraordinary distances. Astonishingly, some still inhabit their original homes. The Shosoin Treasure House, an eighth-century repository in Nara, Japan, stands in its original location with its contents practically intact. This wooden building was constructed to store the objects dedicated in memory of an emperor to the Todaiji monastery, associated with the Buddhist temple of the same name. Its thousands of objects, including furniture, clothing, musical instruments, weapons and armor, were made not only close by in Japan and in neighboring China and Korea, but also in Central Asia and perhaps even farther west. The treasure dramatically illustrates how far prized articles traveled, and what exalted levels of society acquired them. Examples of textiles and other perishable items occasionally survive from burials in certain arid regions of Central Asia and northwestern China. Most numerous today, however, are the objects made in more durable materials—chiefly metal, ceramic, and glass—which were often buried in tombs or hoards and have been unearthed in modern times through accidental discoveries, scientific excavations, and deliberate looting.
One of the most sophisticated and widely admired of luxury arts was nurtured by the Sasanian dynasty, which emerged in the early third century as a political power from its homeland in southwestern Iran. Until 651, the Sasanians ruled a vast empire extending over present-day Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Positioned strategically between the Byzantine Empire to the west and the kingdoms of Central Asia and Tang dynasty China (618–907) to the east, they fought wars, engaged in trade, and exchanged diplomatic missions with neighbors as well as those in distant realms. Artisans in the Sasanian Empire created magnificent silver vessels, often with gilt decoration, which enjoyed enormous prestige both within the empire and beyond its frontiers. They often sought inspiration for shapes and decoration among a range of artistic traditions: southwest Asia, the Mediterranean, and Central Asia. In turn, these vessels influenced the forms, manufacturing techniques, and ornament of luxury metalwork and ceramics produced in other kingdoms along the trade routes linking China and the Mediterranean world.
Iran, Sasanian period, ca. 300–400 C.E.
Silver and gilt; dia. 24.0 cm (9 1/2 in.)
Purchase F1934.23
One of the earliest and most enduring of the royal images created during the Sasanian period shows the king on horseback hunting select quarry: boar, lion, antelope (or gazelle). The image, often embellished with gilding, was depicted on the interior of silver plates, about thirty of which have been found in Iran and neighboring countries. Produced in imperial workshops, these plates were given as official gifts from the king to high-ranking individuals within or beyond the empire’s frontiers. In the early centuries of Sasanian rule, silver production was controlled by a royal monopoly and could be minted into coins or fashioned into objects only on the king’s authority.
Although the royal figures on the plates are not labeled, often they can be identified by their crowns that sometimes also appear on coin portraits of individual Sasanian kings. The figure on this plate is generally identified as Shapur II (reigned 309–79). According to the Book of Kings, even as a child he displayed the great wisdom that characterized the ideal ruler.
Iran of Afghanistan
Sasanian period, 600–650
Silver and gilt
Gift of Arthur M. Sackler, S1987.105
This bowl, made in Iran or Central Asia during the Sasanian period (224–651) depicts scenes from the life of the nobility. A man and woman grasp a wreath, a ritual that seems to signify the ceremonial observation of a marriage contract. The other scenes probably depict events that accompanied the celebration: a servant approaching the couple, a wrestling match, two people playing a board game, and musicians playing harp and drum. The couple and the servant are depicted with a variety of sumptuous vessels, including bowls on tall bases, ewers, and an animal-shaped drinking vessel.
Iran
Sasanian period, 400–600
silver and gilt
Hammered, repousse, chased, and gilded
Gift of Arthur M. Sackler, S1987.118
Initially, Sasanian precious metalwork primarily served as royal propaganda. Court artisans fashioned silver into works of art embellished with royal images, which the king gave as gifts to high-ranking officials and heads of state. Later, when silver supplies were no longer reserved for royal use, artisans created opulent vessels for the Sasanian nobility to use in dining and banqueting. A silver ewer used to pour wine, probably made in Iran and inscribed by its Iranian owner, combines a shape that was also popular in the Roman and Byzantine Empires with images of dancing females, who may personify a Zoroastrian concept of the soul.
Sasanian silver also stimulated the production of precious metal and ceramic luxury arts in Tang dynasty China. Silver vessels made in the Sasanian Empire and locally crafted versions have been found in the tombs of wealthy individuals in northwestern China. In some cases, artisans may have traveled along with traders or in search of employment, and in so doing, they brought their craft traditions and styles with them. New fashions in metalwork encouraged artisans in China to develop their own industry in gold and silver vessels, introducing foreign shapes, subjects, ornament, and techniques. Metalsmiths often combined local and foreign forms on a single object. On the back of a Tang dynasty mirror, a separate sheet of silver is decorated with traditional Chinese creatures—a winged horse, a dragon, and two phoenixes—set among floral scrolls formed from peony blossoms. This style of ornament, consisting of floral scrolls inhabited by animals or human figures, was created centuries earlier in the Mediterranean world and traveled east along with other forms of ornament.
China
Tang dynasty, 700–750
Silver and gilt
Freer Gallery of Art Purchase F1930.50
China, Tang dynasty
Silver and gilt
Purchase F1930.51
China
Tang dynasty, 700–750
Silver and gilt
Purchase F1931.8
China
Tang dynasty (700–750)
Bronze, silver, and gilt
Purchase F1954.22
The prestige of silver and gilt vessels even inspired potters to create new shapes and styles of decoration. Many white stoneware and porcelain vessels made during the Tang dynasty were intended specifically to imitate the shapes and reflective surfaces of silver vessels. These sumptuous articles must have appealed to their owners in large measure for their markedly foreign character. Viewed from a different perspective, they also demonstrate vividly that elite preferences in the design and decoration of luxury tableware and personal ornaments often transcended immense geographical and cultural distances, two thousand years ago.
China
Tang dynasty (800–900)
Porcelain with colorless glaze
Gift of Charles Lang Freer F1914.93
China
Tang dynasty, 750
White stoneware with colorless glaze
Purchase F1984.8
China, Tang dynasty (700–900)
Porcelain with colorless glaze and copper repair
Gift of Charles Lang Freer F1917.404