Woman-shaped salt vessels as one of the signifiers of Armenian folk culture
Since ancient times, Armenians have attributed various magical and auspicious qualities to salt. Across different settlements of Armenia, that holy seasoning was stored and served in unique, woman-shaped salt cellars. Those anthropomorphic small-sized pots have become one of the signifiers of the Armenian culture and were linked with the ideas of fertility and life cycle. Even in rural areas nowadays, such dishes are displayed in the house's most important corner.In pre-Christian Armenia, the woman-shaped or female-formed salt cellars were associated with worshiping the beloved goddess Anahit, the deity of fertility, healing, wisdom, and water in Armenian mythology. Some of them
Well-preserved, lavishly painted, and gold-adorned marble warriors from China
Two pieces of painted white marble reliefs, dating back to the Five Dynasties (907-960), depict two august warriors safeguarding the tomb of Wang Chuzhi in North China’s Hebei province. They’re wearing armor and holding swords, with a dragon and a phoenix on their heads and an ox and deer crouching beneath their feet. What makes them unique is that both of them have been lavishly painted. Having parts of their armor applied with gold pigment suggests the tomb owner’s eminent status. Having been stolen from the tomb of Wang Chuzhi, a high-ranking military officer, in Quyang county, Hebei province, in 1994,
The past and present of the Armenian woodcraft (interview)
The Armenian Highland provided rich material for craftsmen to create wooden art objects, architectural details, and decorative items, such as distinguished pulpit-lecterns (a 10th-century and 13th-century church lecterns from the medieval Armenian capital Ani), carved capitals, utilitarian dinnerware, solid entrance doors for monasteries and churches, often covered with geometrical, avian, and zoomorphic motifs, human forms, biblical scenes, inscriptions, conveying not only symbols of personal and national identity, but also echoing the pre-Christian belief system later merged with the visualizations of Christian faith. In addition, the ornamental design of the woodcraft parallels the cross-stone art, manuscript illumination art, metalwork, and textile
Clogs as luxurious items of the Armenian dowry
The clogs that once belonged to an Armenian woman found their permanent place in 2013 in the collection of the British Museum ( See, clog (qabqāb), 19th century, Aleppo, wood, textile, metal, repoussé, the British Museum, 2013,6033.2.a-b). As part of a collection of ethnographic artifacts given by Zeina Klink-Hoppe in September 2013, artifacts were collected in Lebanon and Syria between 1995 and 2005. These clogs were given to Zeina Klink-Hoppe by an Armenian lady whose family settled in Aleppo after the Armenian Genocide of 1915. The clogs had originally belonged to the lady's grandmother, who had received them as part of
The hairpin used by the nomadic people of China
The dangling hairpins, called buyao, were once widely used by women during the reign of the Han Dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE). One such artifact was unearthed in Inner Mongolia in the 1980s, later becoming a significant exhibit in the National Museum of China. The present golden buyao has the shape of an antler with a horse head, dating to the Southern and Northern Dynasties (420-581 CE). Unlike the common buyao with phoenix, bird, and floral patterns prevalent in the Central Plain of China, it reflects the nomadic Xianbei people’s distinctive zoomorphic designs and artistry. The delicate thin layers of the peach-shaped
