Lot 11. A Guan-type triple-spouted 'double-gourd' vase, seal mark and period of Qianlong (1736-1795); 20.6 cm, 8 ⅛ in. Estimate: 800,000 - 1,200,000 HKD. Lot sold 1,701,000 HKD. Courtesy Sotheby's.

of three-lobed double-gourd form, skilfully potted with the lower bulb rising from a trefoil foot to a slender waisted neck surmounted by the smaller upper bulb tapering to three tubular spouts, covered overall in a lustrous pale greyish-green glaze suffused with fine crackles, inscribed to the base with a six-character seal mark.

Note: Similar triple vases with finely shaped trefoil feet are known covered with various greenish glazes inspired by Song dynasty glazes. A vase of this form with a crackled glaze, described as ‘sky-blue’, is illustrated in Geng Baochang, Ming Qing ciqi jianding [Appraisal of Ming and Qing Porcelain], Hong Kong, 1993, pl. 446; one without the distinct decorative crackles, in the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, is illustrated in He Li, Chinese Ceramics. A New Standard Guide, London, 1996, pl. 521; another is published in John Ayers, Chinese Ceramics in the Baur Collection, Geneva, 1999, pl. 270; two others were sold in our London rooms, 26th April 1966, lot 163 and 164; and a vase, from the Meiyintang Collection, was sold in these rooms, 7th June 2011, lot 34. See a further example sold in these rooms, 5th October 2016, lot 3646.

For the prototype of this form, see a Yongzheng mark and period example, from the Hershel V. Johnson Collection, sold in our London rooms, 21st February 1967, lot 61.