Page 80 - Bonhams, Fine Chinese Art, London November 3, 2022

The box and cover are decorated with eight ruyi-
shaped cartouches, each enclosing a figural scene
with a sage and attendant within landscape. They
each represent a different renowned literatus, who
was a scholar, poet or calligrapher, shown in the
form of a scholar-official or sage with his attendant
and in a scene depicting an attributable feature of
anecdotal story unique to the person. They share
the characteristic of pursuing a particular devotion,
often leading a life of a recluse in preference over
civic duties.

In the context of the Qing Manchu Court, referencing
1 these highly renowned Han literati on a vessel
specially commissioned for the Imperial Court,
exemplifies the Manchu emperors’ and specifically
the Qianlong emperor’s intellectual ambitions and
endeavours to formulate their image as learned
scholars sustaining the values embodied in China’s
past. The Qianlong emperor wrote thousands of
poems, practiced calligraphy and played the qin. He
also formed one of the most important collections of
art. Therefore the reference to the famous literati, the
values they held and their artwork, would have held
a special meaning to him.
These are on the cover:

1. A scholar and attendant are shown in front of two
cranes below a willow tree. Cranes are symbolic
of long life. The sage depicted may be Lin Hejing
2 also known as Lin Bu (967-1028 AD), a Northern
Song dynasty renowned poet, calligrapher and
scholar who lived as a recluse by the West Lake
in Hangzhou. Although he was offered prestigious
government positions, he refused all civic duties
to pursue poetry. He is known to have loved plum
blossoms and to raise cranes. It was said that the
plum tree was his wife and the cranes his children.

2. A male attendant is offering a goose to a sage
seated under bamboo. This scene could be
identified as depicting the story of Wang Xizhi
catching the goose. Wang Xizhi, regarded as the
greatest Chinese calligrapher, was a writer and
politician who lived during the Jin dynasty (265–420
AD), and known for his hobby of rearing geese.

3. A sage holding a gnarled staff is standing in front
3 of a garden pavilion below pine and a eucalyptus
tree with a male attendant holding a floral sprig,
beside further blossoms which may represent
chrysanthemums. This may represent Tao Yuanming
(365-427 AD), a Chinese poet who spent much of
his life as a recluse tending to his chrysanthemums,
writing poems in which he often reflected on the
pleasures and difficulties of life, as well as his
decision to withdraw from civil service, finding
inspiration in the beauty and serenity of the natural
world around him.

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