Lot 51. A Guan-type arrow-handled vase, hu, Seal mark and period of Yongzheng (1723-1735); 27 cm, 10 ⅝ in. Estimate: 700,000 - 900,000 HKD. Lot sold 1,638,000 HKD. Courtesy Sotheby's.

of archaistic hu form, superbly potted with a flattened pear-shaped body rising from a splayed recessed foot to a tall neck set with a pair of tubular handles, encircled with moulded horizontal bands, covered overall in a brilliant unctuous pale greyish-green glaze, the base inscribed with a six-character seal mark in underglaze blue.

Note: The form of the present vase is derived originally from Shang and Zhou dynasty bronze prototypes, however, the unctuous pale bluish-grey glaze suffused with fine crackles is evocative of Song dynasty Guan wares that also imitated ancient ritual vessels, and were much admired by the antiquity-loving Qing court. A vase of very similar size and form but covered with a Ge-type crackled glaze, Yongzheng mark and period, was included in the Catalog of the Special Exhibition of K'ang-hsi, Yung-cheng and Ch'ien-lung Porcelain Ware from the Ch'ing Dynasty in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, 1986, no. 63. Compare also a Ru-type vase of slightly similar form, also with a Yongzheng mark and of the period, sold in these rooms, 23rd October 2005, lot 319; and another sold at Christie's Hong Kong, 26th April 2004, lot 946. For larger Yongzheng vases of this form and glaze, see one from the Cleveland Museum of Art, sold at Christie's New York, 21st September 2000, lot 369; and another sold in these rooms, 8th April 2011, lot 3014.

For the prototype of this vase, originally inspired by an archaic bronze hu, compare the Longquan vase of slightly larger size (31.5 cm) and very similar form, in the Qing court collection, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Porcelain of the Song Dynasty, Hong Kong, 1996, vol. 2, pl. 102.