Lot 105. A peachbloom-glazed 'beehive' waterpot, taibaizun, mark and period of Kangxi (1662-1722). Diameter 5 in., 12.7 cm. Estimate: 400,000 - 600,000 HKD. Lot sold 945,000 HKD. Courtesy Sotheby's.

of classic domed taibai zun form, the tapering sides rising to a rounded shoulder and a short waisted neck below a lipped mouth-rim, the sides delicately incised with three stylized archaistic dragon roundels, the exterior applied with a vivid crimson-red glaze transmuting to a beige-pink mottled with raspberry-tinged flecks imitating the skin of a ripening peach, the neck with a green-flecked, mushroom-beige concentration, the countersunk base inscribed with an underglaze-blue six-character mark in three columns.  

Note: Peachbloom waterpots of this shape known as taibo zun after the wine jar of the poet Li Taibai, belong to the eight peachbloom wares for the scholar's desk, of which a complete set in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, is illustrated in Suzanne G. Valenstein, A Handbook of Chinese Ceramics, New York, 1989, p. 237. See a similar example in the Percival David Foundation, London, included in the Illustrated Catalogue of Ming and Qing Monochrome Wares, London, 1989, cat. no. 580, also illustrated on the front cover. Compare also a similar waterpot sold in these rooms, 4th April 2012, lot 3101.