QIANLONG SEAL MARK IN UNDERGLAZE BLUE AND OF THE PERIOD (1736-1795)

This flask is particularly rare as others of this design are usually of larger size (19½ in. high) such as the examples illustrated in in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, in Blue and White Ware of the Ch'ing Dynasty, vol. 2, Hong Kong, 1968, pl. 15; two in Chinese Ceramics in the Idemitsu Collection, Japan, 1987, pls. 949 and 950; and by M. Beurdeley and G. Raindre in Qing Porcelain, New York, 1987, pl. 154. On these larger flasks the handles are of a different shape and there is more space between the eight lotus petals and the outer key-fret border. A similar blue and white flask of the same unusual small size, also with Qianlong seal mark, from the collection of the Manno Art Museum, was sold in our London rooms, 21 June 2001, lot 106. A larger version of this type of moonflask, also with Qianlong seal mark, from the Greenwald collection, was sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 1 December 2010, lot 2826.