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

The Qianlong Emperor had a keen interest in the revival of antiquities, and commissioned the Imperial kilns at Jingdezhen to produce ceramics imitating Song period shapes and glazes. The shape of this washer is modelled after Song prototypes; see a Southern Song dynasty guan washer of similar form but without the tripod feet, published in the Catalogue of the Special Exhibition of Sung Dynasty Kuan Ware, Taipei, 1989, no. 137. Compare to a Qianlong marked washer of similar form but covered in a guan-type glaze, from the collections of the J.M. Hu family and Robert Chang, sold at Sotheby’s New York, 4 June 1985, lot 65, and again at Christie’s Hong Kong, 2 November 1999, lot 517.