Page 425 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

European Influences in Ch'ing Dynasty 257

But to return to the armorial porcelain : apart from its heraldic

and decorative value, it is often important to the student of Chinese

ceramics, because there are specimens which can be dated very

precisely from the armorial bearings and other internal evidence.

In the British Museum series there are some twenty pieces belonging

to the K'ang Hsi period, including an early underglaze blue painted

dish with arms of Talbot, and one or two specimens of purefamille verte,

including the plate dated 1702, which has already been mentioned

as being of a peculiar white and glassy-looking ware. There are

examples with underglaze blue and enamel decoration in the Chinese

Imari style, and there is a very distinctive group which can be

dated armorially^ to the late K'ang Hsi and early Yung Cheng

period. These latter pieces are usually decorated with a shield of

arms in the centre in enamel colours, with or without underglaze

blue ; the sides are filled with a band of close floral scrolls or bro-
cade diaper in red and gold, broken by small reserves containing

flowers and symbols ; on the rim are similar groups of flowers

and symbols and a narrow border of red and gold scrolls ; and on
the reverse are a few floral sprays in red. The enamels are of the

transition kind, famille verte with occasional touches of rose pink

and opaque yellow. The porcelain is the crisp, sonorous, well

potted ware with shining oily glaze of K'ang Hsi type, and the

Aaccessory ornament is of purely Chinese character. border of

trefoil cusps, not unlike the strawberry leaves of the heraldic crown,

but traceable to a Chinese origin, makes its first appearance on

this group. It is a common feature of subsequent armorial wares,
like the narrow border of chain pattern which seems to have come

into use about 1730.

Dated specimens of Yung Cheng armorial, with painting in the

" foreign colours," have been already described.^ Other examples
of this period have the decoration in underglaze blue outlines washed
with thin transparent colours, in black pencilling and in black
and gold. The border patterns of lacework, vine scrolls, bamboos
wreathed with foliage and flowers, and fine floral scrolls, are often
beautifully executed in delicate gilding or in brown and gold.

In the Ch'ien Lung period there was an ever-increasing tendency
to displace the Chinese patterns in favour of European ornament.

1 One of these pieces, for instance, is a plate witli arms of Sir Jolin Lambert, who
was created a baronet in 1711 and died in 1722. It has enamels of the transition kind.

«P. 209.

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