Lot 1. A rare pair of Famille-Verte 'Peach' saucers, Qing dynasty, Kangxi period (1662-1722); 9.5cm., 3 3/4 in. Estimate 400,000—600,000 HKD. Lot Sold 596,000 HKD. Photo Sotheby's 2011

each dish of delicately potted shallow saucer shape with a slightly recessed centre, painted on the inside with a branch bearing a large green peach with a yellow tip merging into red and green, partly worm-eaten leaves, the exterior left plain

Provenance: Collection of Edward T. Chow.
Sotheby's Hong Kong, 19th May 1981, lot 577.
Sotheby's Hong Kong, 19th November 1986, lot 282.

Literature: Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics from the Meiyintang Collection, London, 1994-2010, vol. 2, no. 771.

Note: Peaches as longevity symbols became popular motifs for decorating food vessels with the massive efforts to produce porcelains for the Kangxi Emperor's 60th birthday celebrations in 1713. The characteristic famille verte colour scheme then produced by the imperial kilns, which represents an adaptation of the wucai palette, may have been devised specially for these festivities, or in any case was preferred, since the omission of underglaze blue from the colour scheme made the polychrome palette more manageable.

Extant examples of this design are rare. A pair of similar saucers from the Elphinstone and Percival David collections is recorded in Lady David, Illustrated Catalogue of Ch'ing Enamelled Wares in the Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, London, 1958, nos 879 and 880, the former sold in our London rooms 15th October 1968, lot 136, and again at Christie's Geneva, 14th November 1975, lot 65; the latter still in the collection and now on display in the British Museum, London; another pair was included in The 7th Annual Exhibition of Porcelain of Ch'ing Dynasty, Min Ch'iu Society, Hong Kong, 1968, cat. no. 28; and a third pair was sold in these rooms, 20th May 1987, lot 570.

Sotheby's. The Meiyintang Collection - An Important Selection of Imperial Chinese Porcelains, 07 Apr 11, Hong Kong