A Meissen white figure of a seated pagoda from the Japanese Palace, circa 1715-20. photo Bonhams

Crisply moulded, with his right hand resting on his upraised right knee, the mouth and ears pierced, 9.7cm high, incised Japanese Palace inventory number N=87-/ W to rear of figure. Lot 2. Estimate: £10,000 - 15,000 / €12,000 - 18,000 / US$ 16,000 - 24,000

Provenance:: Mrs Sigmund J. Katz, Covington, Louisiana, sold Sotheby's London, 25 June 1968, lot 211

This pagoda is recorded in the first inventory of Böttger stoneware and porcelain in Augustus the Strong's collection, the inventory of 'das Palais zu Alt Dreßden Anno 1721'. It lists the contents of the 'Holländische Palais', which had been acquired by the Elector in 1717 and was later to be transformed into the Japanese Palace. The 1721 inventory (with additions to 1727) lists under no. 87: '6. Stk. sizende Pagoden mit offenen Mäulern. 4. Z. hoch,' [6 seated pagodas with open mouths. 4 Z[oll] high]; published in Böttgersteinzeug Böttgerporzellan (1969), p. 46. The model was first produced in Böttger stoneware from around 1711 and presumably in porcelain from 1713. The inventories of the warehouses in Dresden and Leipzig made in 1719 list several dozen pagodas, and the model appears to have been produced in large numbers in the mid 1720s (U. Pietsch/C. Banz, Triumph der blauen Schwerter (2010), cat. no. 13).

The 1770 inventory of the Japanese Palace, Dresden, lists under no. 87: 'Drey Stück sitzende Pagoden, mit offenen Mäulern, 4. Zoll hoch' [three seated pagodas, with open mouths, 4 Zoll high]; published by C. Boltz, Japanisches Palais-Inventar 1770 und Turmzimmer-Inventar 1769, in Keramos 153 (1996), p. 21.

Bonhams. 23 May 2012 10:30 a.m. London, New Bond Street. Fine European Ceramics