Note: The Three Star Gods are thought to have been first depicted in human form in the Ming dynasty, and became widely recognized as personifications of good fortune. They are associated with folk cults and ancestral shrines, rather than more established religions, and so enjoy a universal appeal.

A censer in the Shanghai Museum, of similar form but decorated with the Eighteen Luohans and with an inscription dating to 1695, is illustrated by Wang Qingzheng, Underglaze Blue & Red, Hong Kong, 1987, p. 118, no. 114. Two further censers are illustrated by Sir Michael Butler and Wang Qingzheng, Seventeenth Century Jingdezhen Porcelain from the Shanghai Museum and the Butler Collections, Hong Kong/London, 2006: one from the Shanghai Museum decorated in blue and white with Shoulao and the Eight Immortals on p. 274-75, no. 99; and another smaller censer from the Butler Family Collection, decorated in underglaze blue and enamels and dated to 1696, on pp. 298-99, no. 111.

Compare, also a Kangxi blue and white jardinière of similar size to the present censer, also decorated with the three characters fu, lu and shou, but each character with a superimposed leaf-form scene of scholars or birds and flowers, illustrated by Chen Runmin (ed.), Qing Shunzhi Kangxi Chao Qinghua Ci, Beijing, 2005, pp. 382-83, no. 245.

Christie's. Important Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, New York, 13 September 2019