There appear to be three other published examples of this rare pattern. One presently in the British Museum, illustrated by Addis, Chinese Porcelain from the Addis Collection, pl. 15; one in the Trevelyan Collection at Wallington, Northumberland, currently property of the National Trust, England, and illustrated by Michael Archer 'Pottery and Porcelain at Wallington', Country Life, 18th June 1970, fig. 1, the dish is incised with an inscription that identifies it as being formerly in the collection of the Moghul Emperor Shah Jehan and dated 1968 A.D.; the last dish sold in London, 10 December 1991, lot 228.

Compare also to the dish with a similar lotus medallion but with varient decoration in the well below the barbed rim excavated from the early Yongle stratum at Jingdezhen included in the exhibition of Imperial Porcelain of the Yongle and Xuande Periods Excavated from the Site of the Ming Imperial Factory at Jingdezhen, Catalogue, 1989, figs. 3 and 4.

Dishes of this small group are noted for their boldness of design and softness of brushstroke with very subtle and controlled shading. Cf. other dishes with this central configuration of a peony spray with two blooms such as the example excavated at Jingdezhen illustrated in op. cit., figs. 1 and 2; another illustrated by T. Misugi, Chinese Porcelain Collections in the Near East, The Topkapi Palace Museum, vol. 2, pl. XIII, where the dish is illustrated in centre of the display case in the old kitchen along with other Yuan and early Ming period wares; and the dish sold in these Rooms, 1 May 1995, lot 641.

(US$70,000-90,000)