釉裏紅五蝠紋盌　　雙圈雙行六字楷書款

The five bats, wufu, are a homophone for the 'Five Blessings', which are long life, wealth, health, love of virtue and a good end to one's life. The pattern was one of the designs on porcelain supplied to the Court listed in 1729 by Tang Ying, director of the imperial porcelain factory during the Yongzheng and Qianlong reigns, and translated by S. Bushell in Oriental Ceramic Art, London, 1981, p. 198.

There are several examples of this pattern published. The Baur Collection has a bowl with the 'five bats' motif, illustrated by J. Ayers, Chinese Ceramics in the Baur Collection, vol. 2, Geneva, 1999, pl. 199; and another example was sold at Christie's London, 15 June 1998, lot 164.