Images

Cong is the name given to a type of jade of unknown purpose, found in burials of the Neolithic period in Southeast China. The Cong has a square cross-section with a cylindrical hole. Congs are often decorated at the corners...

The "you" type bronze ritual vessel is a form of a lidded vessel. The container was made by adjoining two birds back to back. Shang Dynasty, 13th to 12th century BCE. From modern-day China. (The British Museum, London...

A "hu" is a type of wine vessel which displays a pear-shaped cross-section. This bronze carries a fine example of the monster face, known as taotie, shown in the main central panel, with its eyes on each side of the...

Bodhisattvas are enlighted beings who have chosen to stay in the world to help others achieve Buddhahood. Avalokitesvara is the Bodhisattva of Compassion, known in Chinese as Guanyin. Guanyin is short for Guanshiyin...

This container, presumably for wine, is flanked by the heads and forequarters of two rams. The rams are very lifelike and this realistic style of decoration suggests it might have been made in Hunan province. Shang Dynasty...

A model of the medieval Benedictine monastery of Cluny Abbey in France, founded in the early 10th century CE.

A stained glass window from Saint-Corentin Cathedral, Quimper, France, showing two kneeling Franciscan monks.

A 13th century CE illuminated manuscript showing a monk tasting wine as he draws off a jug from a barrel. ('Li Livres dou Santé', British Library, London)

A painting of four monks by Claudio Rinaldi (1852-1909 CE). (Dorotheum, Munich)

Detail of a limestone statue of a Sumerian female in a gesture of prayer. The eye sockets were filled in with white shell set in bitumen. She wears a Sumerian garment with a bare right shoulder...