A standing pottery figure of an official, his hands clasped together inside long sleeves. He wears an amber robe with green lapels and green-streaked sleeve ends, the glaze running in drips down over the cream skirt. The head is left unglazed, with a tall cap crested by a bird with spread wings and traces of red pigment at the cap band. The figure is hollow and open at the base.
Tang tombs were furnished with whole processions of clay attendants, officials, horses and camels, set out to serve the dead as they had served them in life. Sancai, "three-colour", is the amber, green and cream lead glaze the Tang potters let flow freely over these figures. The faces were usually left unglazed so they could be painted, and the touch of red on this one's cap is what survives of that paint.
Condition: Original head, reattached at the neck, with a restored crack across the right side of the face. Loss to the front-left of the lower robe and hem, chips to the base rim, and glaze wear to the lower robe.
