Female Attendant, one of five

Shown standing in a quiet and respectful attitude holding small, pear-shaped covered vases, these figures of young women represent court attendants. Dressed in similar attire, with aquamarine blue scarves, red-striped skirts, and high-waisted dresses, they all have the full, round faces, slender figures, and double topknots that were fashionable during the early Tang dynasty (618-906). It was common for aristocratic tombs to include numerous ceramic figurines, but it is unusual for sets such as this to survive intact. Reusable molds allowed for the mass-manufacture of grave objects such as these and accounts for the nearly identical forms seen in four of these five figures.