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Strange foot rim for 18th century?

I would like to ask your opinion of the bowl pictured in the attached photos. It looks to me like Chinese Export, but the footrim is not typical. Could you comment on age and origin. Is it 18th C. Chinese Export or something else?


A wash basin from late 19th century

Dear Sir,

This bowl is an ordinary wash basin. It is partly ritual but mostly just functional. These were exported to the Chinese communities outside China, foremost in South East Asia. That I know for sure. Probably they also got around elsewhere too and some probably stayed in China.

Thus I don't really think this basin should be called an export, ware since I think for something to be celled export porcelain I think it in shape and decoration should be adapted specifically for a foreign market so much so that it is useless or unrecognizably locally, and this I don't think is the case with this wash basin.

Regarding a date for pieces with this decoration, looking at the red bransches under the rim, the soft "faded" colors of the enamels and in some ways the faces of the figures I feel they should be dated to the Tongzhi (1862-74) period. Somehow I also think this decoration was around longer than that, and that a bowl with this sparse decoration might be more correctly described as from the Guangxu (1875-1908) period.

When it comes to the base finally, it is a bit unusual to find it flat and unglazed but this is not a problem for a wash basin from this periond and fits well with a date around the late 19th century.

Hopefully this helps at least some.

Best regards,
Jan-Erik Nilsson