A narrow-necked clay flask or bottle, whose name is onomatopoeic — mimicking the gurgling sound of liquid poured from its narrow neck. Used both as a common vessel and as a prophetic object in Jeremiah.
The baqbuq in Jeremiah 19 becomes one of Scripture's most dramatic object lessons. God commands the prophet to buy a potter's earthen flask, carry it to the Valley of Hinnom, and smash it before the elders — declaring that God would break Jerusalem just as irreparably as that jar. An earthen vessel, once shattered, cannot be repaired. The image teaches both the fragility of human institutions that rebel against God and the finality of His judgment. Yet it also anticipates Paul's great reversal: 'We have this treasure in jars of clay' (2 Corinthians 4:7) — weakness becomes the very vessel of divine glory.