YONGLE PERIOD (1403-1435)

This exquisitely painted dish represents the finest of Yongle blue and white wares, and is of a rare, small size for dishes of this period and design. This type of dish is more usually found in larger sizes with varying designs ranging from 14-17 inches diameter. A handful of similar dishes to the present example, with almost identical design, are in private and museum collections; Percival David Collection, London, illustrated by M. Medley in The World’s Great Collections: Oriental Ceramics, vol. 6, New York, 1982, no. 77; British Museum, London, illustrated by J. Harrison-Hall in Catalogue of Late Yuan and Ming Ceramics in the British Museum, London, 2001, p. 115, no. 3:32; H. M. King of Sweden, illustrated in the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm exhibition catalogue Ming Blue-and-White from Swedish Collections, Stockholm, 1964, p. 33, no. 9, listed on p. 18; Mrs. Alfred Clark, London, illustrated by Spink & Son Ltd., Blue and White Porcelain from the collection of Mrs. Alfred Clark, London, 1974, no. 8.

A few other dishes of similar size and design have been sold at auction in the past decades, including one from the Collection of the late Mr. and Mrs. R. H. R. Palmer, Christie’s Hong Kong, 17 January 1989, lot 562, one sold at Sotheby’s New York, 19 September 2002, lot 105, and another from a Japanese private collection sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 1 June 2011, lot 3821.

Three related dishes with barbed rims of comparable size to the present dish, similarly decorated with a central floral motif enclosed by floral-spray panels in the well, from the Ardebil Shrine, Iran, are illustrated by J. A. Pope in Chinese Porcelains from the Ardebil Shrine, Washington, D. C., 1956, nos. 29.271, 29.272, 29.274, pl. 29.