Lacquer dish with flowers, Ming dynasty, Xuande mark and period (1426-1436), wood, covered in fabric, and then covered in yellow and red lacquer, with decoration carved through red lacquer, 6.2 cm (height), 54.3 cm (diameter), at foot 43 cm estimated (diameter). Purchased, 1981. EA1981.9 © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

Carved red lacquer dish on wooden base with a fabric foundation. All over decoration with a central motif of a peony, and gardenia camellia, chrysanthemum, lotus, waterweed, peach, prunus and cherry blossom. Six character mark of Xuande 1426-1436 incised on the base.