Lot Essay
Compare the closely related brush handle, with its cap, also with a vertical reign mark within a cartouche, illustrated by Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, vol. 2, London, 1994, pp. 88-91, no. 711. Other examples with horizontal reign marks include the example in the Shanghai Museum illustrated in Zhongguo taoci quanji (The Great Treasury of Chinese Ceramics), vol. 21, Shanghai, 1981, no. 44 and the one in the Fogg Art Museum, included in The Arts of the Ming, The Detroit Institute of Arts, 1952, Catalogue, no. 176