Chinese Style Dragon Pattern Clay Grey Color Unglazed Eaves Roof Tile

Chinse Style Dragon Pattern Clay Grey Color Unglazed Eaves Roof Tile

Eaves tiles are small accessories from classical Chinese architecture fixed at the end of rafters for decoration and for shielding the eaves from wind and rain. 4000 years after their debut on the rough-built palace of Zhou (c. 11th century 771 B.C.), these tiles ended up lying on tables of researchers of ancient politics, economics, art, handicraft, calligraphy and text-interpretation, as well as those of enthusiastic collectors.

Eaves tiles emerged as a culture in their own light during the Zhou and reached their zenith during the Qin and Han (221B.C-220 A.D.). In the intervening years they underwent a transition from a half-round design to a cylindrical design, and from plain surface to decorative patterns, from intaglio to bas-relief carvings, from lifelike imagery to abstraction, and from patterns to inscriptions, until they became an art that involves language, literature, aesthetics, calligraphy, carving, decoration and architecture, with themes that ran the gamut from nature and ecology to mythology, totems, history, palaces, yamens, mausoleums, place names, auspicious phrases, folklore, and family names.