The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 19, 2025

Orange-brown earthenware sculpture shaped as a stylized horse with four cylindrical legs, a short, pointed tail, and a rectangular, flat snout. The horse has a bridle over its face and a saddle on its back, the band running in front of its chest decorated with small spheres, two larger sphere's just behind the saddle. A mane sticking up like a fin runs between two pointed ears. Cylindrical holes in the face represent the eyes.

Haniwa Horse

400s–500s CE

Japan, Kofun period

(300–710 CE)
earthenware with traces of pigment
Overall: 59.7 x 66 cm (23 1/2 x 26 in.)
The Norweb Collection 1957.27
Location: 235A Japanese

Description

This horse’s tack, with its round bells, resembles saddlery in fashion in Korea during the 400s–500s CE. Concurrent with mass migration from the Korean Peninsula, tombs covered with large earthen mounds similar to those on the Asian continent began to appear in Japan around the year 300 CE. Called “old mounds” (kofun), their surfaces were covered with hollow clay cylinders (haniwa). Sculptures of animals, buildings, and finally human figures followed, developing over the ensuing three centuries.
  • ?–1957
    The Norweb Collection, Cleveland, OH, given by Mrs, R. Henry Norweb [1895–1984] to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    1957–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 895 archive.org
    "Recent Accessions Briefly Noted." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 46, no. 4 (April 1959): 60–61. Reproduced: p. 61 www.jstor.org
    Lee, Sherman E. "Contrasts in Chinese and Japanese Art." Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 21, no. 1 (Fall 1962): 3–12. Reproduced: fig. 13, p. 8 www.jstor.org
    Lee, Sherman E. A History of Far Eastern Art. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1964. Reproduced: fig. 79, p. 73
    Hane, Mikiso. Japan; a Historical Survey. [New York]: Scribner, 1972. Reproduced: p. 25
    Stitt, Irene. Japanese Ceramics of the Last 100 Years. New York: Crown Publishers, 1974. Reproduced: p. 3, Fig. 3
    Matsumara, Gentaro. The Emperor's Island: The Story of Japan; (1). Tokyo: Lotus Press, 1977. Reproduced: fig. 6
    Gardner, Helen, Horst De la Croix, and Richard G. Tansey. Gardner's Art Through the Ages. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980. Reproduced: fig. 13-1, p. 400
    Gilbert, Rita, and William McCarter. Living with Art. New York: Knopf, 1988. Reproduced: fig. 379, p. 306
    Mittler, Gene A. Art in Focus. Mission Hills, CA: Glencoe Pub. Co, 1989. Reproduced: fig. 20.11, p. 410
    Gardner, Helen, Horst De la Croix, Richard G. Tansey, and Diane Kirkpatrick. Gardner's Art Through the Ages. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1991. Reproduced: fig, 13-1, p. 476
    Hobbs, Jack A. Art in Context. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1991. Reproduced: fig. 2-34, p. 45
    Getlein, Mark. Gilbert's Living with Art. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2002. Reproduced: p. 279, fig. 12.1
    Brommer, Gerald F. Discovering Art History. Worcester, MA: Davis Publications, 2007. Reproduced: p. 102, fig. 4- 43
    Art Documentation: Bulletin of the Art Libraries Society of North America 38, no. 2 (Fall 2019): cover. Reproduced: cover image
    Koyama-Richard, Brigitte. Animaux Dans La Peinture Japonaise. Lyon: Nouvelles éditions Scala, 2020. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 13
    Cunningham, Michael R. "Asian Autumn", Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine. Vol. 35 no. 08, October 1995. Mentioned andn Reproduced: pp. 4–5 archive.org
  • Highlights of Japanese Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 7, 2025-June 14, 2026).
    Animals in Japanese Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 24-December 10, 2023).
    Japanese Gallery 235 Rotation. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (January 7-July 8, 2019).
    Asian Autumn: Early Ceramics from Japan and Korea. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 19-December 3, 1995).
    Traditions and Revisions: Themes from the History of Sculpture. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 24-November 16, 1975).
  • {{cite web|title=Haniwa Horse|url=false|author=|year=400s–500s CE|access-date=19 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1957.27