A Review of Research on Plant Motifs on Everyday Objects of the Song Dynasty

Abstract

The Song dynasty represents a pivotal period in the transformation of Chinese social structure, the rise of Neo-Confucian thought, and the evolution of decorative art. During this era, plant motifs completed a historic transition from the "divine and aristocratic" aesthetic paradigm of the Tang dynasty to a "rational and secularized" one. Grounded in archaeological typology, this article systematically reviews scholarship of the past three decades on plant motifs found on everyday objects of the Song dynasty, focusing on the establishment of periodization frameworks, typological studies linking motifs to social structure, iconographic approaches to interpretation, and specialized research on individual material categories such as ceramics and silk textiles. On this basis, the article argues that existing scholarship suffers from two principal limitations: at the macro level, the sample of motifs examined remains insufficient and cross-category comparison is largely absent; at the micro level, research on different material categories tends to proceed in isolation from one another. This article contends that only by grounding analysis in archaeologically excavated artifacts and integrating motif systems across ceramics, gold and silver ware, and silk textiles can the evolutionary patterns of Song-dynasty plant motifs—and the shifts in social aesthetics they embody—be more fully revealed.