Lot 30. A Superb large carved 'Ding' foliate dish, Northern Song Dynasty (960–1126). Estimate 400,000 — 600,000 USD. Lot sold 1,528,000 USD. © Sotheby's.

the deep rounded sides deftly carved on the interior with a chilong dragon enclosed within the well of the dish and encircled on the cavetto by four peony flower heads with combed detail, borne on a single foliate meander, the reverse similarly carved with a meander bearing four lush peonies overlapping six panels corresponding to the indications at the rim, all supported on a tapered knife-pared foot, applied overall with an even pale ivory glaze with characteristic teardrop streaks on the exterior, the unglazed rim bound with a dark copper band; 9 1/2 in., 24 cm.

Provenance: Edgar Worch, Berlin (1929).
Johannes Hellner, Stockholm (1950).
Christie's New York, 20th November 1979, lot 173.
Christie's Hong Kong, The Imperial Sale, 28th April 1996, lot 43.

Exhibition: Ausstellung chinesischer Kunst, Preussische Akademie der Künste, Berlin, 1929, cat.no.597.

Kinas Kunst i Swensk og Dansk Eje, Det Danske Kunstindustrimuseum, Copenhagen, 1950, cat.no.317.

Exhibition of Ancient Chinese Ceramics, Kau Chi Society of Chinese Art, The Art Gallery, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1981-82, cat.no.18.

Bibliography: Jan Wirgin, Sung Ceramic Designs, Stockholm, 1970, pl.69b.

Note: This dish is one of the finest examples of 'Ding' ware from the best period of production of the Ding kilns in Quyang, Hebei province. The large dish with its subtle indentations and delicately potted foot, is unusually rich in its decoration, and the carving has been executed with particular care, with characteristic double lines and combing. The lively wriggling dragon and the exquisitely detailed peony scroll, which is repeated again on the outside, are the work of an accomplished hand and make the piece one of the masterpieces of Northern Song 'Ding' ware.

One very close companion piece is in the National Palace Museum, Taiwan, illustrated in the Illustrated Catalogue of Sung Dynasty Porcelain in the National Palace Museum: Ting Ware and Ting-type Ware, Taipei, 1973, cat.no.44, and included in the Museum’s Special Exhibition of Ting Ware White Porcelain, Taipei, 1987, cat.no.100, where a closely related bowl was also shown, cat.no.34, as well as a related smaller dish, apparently plain on the outside, cat.no.101.

The motif of the chi dragon appears on many pieces of 'Ding' ware in the National Palace Museum and on at least one piece from the Qing court collection in the Palace Museum, Beijing. It is discussed in the Taipei catalogue, ibid., pp.15f. and 49, where the author, Hsieh Ming-liang, points out that one of the pieces thus decorated (ibid., cat.no.87) is engraved with the characters Shouchengdian ('Hall for Achieving Long Life') and was probably used in the Song imperial palace. Although longdragons also appear on 'Ding' ware, they tend to be more quickly sketched on plain rounded dishes, without any accompanying design, and may be slightly later in date. 

It is very rare to find a dish with a finely incised flower scroll on both sides, as the outsides of 'Ding' dishes were generally treated with less care and either left plain, or carved with sketchy lotus petals, like on a much smaller dish with a chi dragon surrounded by a lotus scroll, also in Taiwan and included in the Illustrated Catalogue, op.cit., pl.45. Only one other comparable dish appears to have appeared at auction, a dish with cut-down rim, reduced to 19 cm in diameter, from the Samuel T. Peters collection, sold at Christie's New York, 23rd June 1982, lot 46.