A MING BLUE AND WHITE SAUCER DISH

Details

A MING BLUE AND WHITE SAUCER DISH
ZHENGDE SIX-CHARACTER MARK IN UNDERGLAZE BLUE WITHIN A DOUBLE CIRCLE AND OF THE PERIOD

The rounded sides rising from a tapered ring foot to the slightly everted rim, well painted on the exterior with two dragons striding through cruciform clouds in pursuit of flaming pearls and on the interior with three vaporous clouds encircled by a double line border below a narrow band of classic scroll at the rim
6 7/8in. (17.4cm.) diam., box

Exhibited

Singapore, The Empress Place Museum, Gems of Chinese Art, 1992, no. 82

Lot Essay

Slightly larger dishes of this design with Zhengde marks include the one illustrated by Regina Krahl in Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, 1994, vol. 2, p. 74, no. 687; another illustrated in Porcelains from the Tianjin Municipal Museum, Hong Kong, 1993, no. 105, 106; and one in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, illustrated in the Catalogue, Blue and White Wares of the Ming Dynasty, Book IV, pl. 11

For a discussion of the origins of this design, see Regina Krahl, op. cit., p. 74. Dishes of this pattern dating to Xuande and Hongzhi were included in the Philadelphia Ming Blue and White Exhibition, 1949, Catalogue, no. 65