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Source Description

This table, chair, and spirit house form a partial recreation of a memorial altar from the Joseon period. The spirit house and chair both include a number of auspicious symbols, including lotuses, conch shells, and chakra wheels. The spirit house would have been placed on the altar chair, and offerings would have been set out on the table for the memorial service. In ancestor veneration rituals, deceased parents or ancestors are sanctified as spirits who are believed to oversee their descendents. Three times a year, once at the lunar new year, once at the person’s death date, and once at the time of the mid-autumn festival, food would be placed on the table for the ancestors, including fruits, rice, meat, and rice wine. During these ceremonies the worshippers’ attitude was as reverential toward the objects meant to embody the ancestors’ spirits as that toward a living parent.

Scholar Source Context

Document identity
localId
160805
label
Spirit House
core
obj
dtoType
object
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
160805
contentType
object
title
Spirit House
description
This table, chair, and spirit house form a partial recreation of a memorial altar from the Joseon period. The spirit house and chair both include a number of auspicious symbols, including lotuses, conch shells, and chakra wheels. The spirit house would have been placed on the altar chair, and offerings would have been set out on the table for the memorial service. In ancestor veneration rituals, deceased parents or ancestors are sanctified as spirits who are believed to oversee their descendents. Three times a year, once at the lunar new year, once at the person’s death date, and once at the time of the mid-autumn festival, food would be placed on the table for the ancestors, including fruits, rice, meat, and rice wine. During these ceremonies the worshippers’ attitude was as reverential toward the objects meant to embody the ancestors’ spirits as that toward a living parent.
date
late 1800s
rights
CC0
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
wikidata
Q79982615
genreSpecific
Metalwork
imageCount
1
source
import
cul
Korea, Joseon dynasty (1392–1910)
accession
1999.12
Source extras
tec
iron inlaid with silver and copper decoration
tombstone
Spirit House (감실 [龕室]), late 1800s. Korea, Joseon dynasty (1392–1910). Iron inlaid with silver and copper decoration. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of The Honorable Joseph P. Carroll and Roberta Carroll, M.D. in memory of Robert P. Bergman, 1999.120
titleInOriginalLanguage
감실 [龕室]
collection
Korean Art
didYouKnow
The belief in two types of souls, the spiritual and the corporeal, embodied the core concept of ancestor worship in traditional China and Korea. While the corporeal soul is believed to reside in the tomb, the spiritual soul, in the spirit house like this example, guards his or her decedents.
citations
citation
Deuchler, Martina. “Mourning and Funerary Rites.” In <em>The Confucian Transformation of Korea</em> (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press), 1992.
citation
Cleveland Museum of Art, “Major Contemporary German Painting Acquired by CMA,” June 9, 1999, Cleveland Museum of Art Archives.
citation
Buswell, Robert E., ed. <em>Religions of Korea in Practice</em>. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007.
citation
<em>Treasures from Korea: Arts and Culture of the Joseon Dynasty, 1392-1910</em>. Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2014.
citation
Ch'a, Mi-rae, Kwi-suk An, Cleveland Museum of Art, and 국외소재문화재재단. <em>The Korean Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art</em>. Edited by An Min-hŭi. First edition, English ed. Overseas Korean Cultural Heritage Series, 16. Seoul, Republic of Korea: Overseas Korean Cultural Heritage Foundation, 2021.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 234–235, no. 129 & no. 130
creditline
Gift of The Honorable Joseph P. Carroll and Roberta Carroll, M.D. in memory of Robert P. Bergman
updatedAt
2026-05-29 08:21:40.509000
sourceId
160805
dept
Korean Art
coll
Korean Art
med
iron inlaid with silver and copper decoration
thumbnail_url
image_url
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
18ec71222e23e6c7