Page 152 - A Re-examination of Late Qing Dynasty Porcelain, 1850-1920 THESIS

the royal families and societal elite. It is early British royal collecting that builds a

foundation for British porcelain collecting. The collecting of Britain forms visual

evidence from which this study will establish the high levels of patronage of the late Qing

era and the overall imperial caliber of the wares. According to Britain’s Royal Collection

Trust, the earliest English ruler to procure porcelain from China was Henry VIII (1491–

1547). His small collection is mentioned in several imperial inventories but ultimately

did not survive beyond Britain’s Civil War, at which point in time the porcelain was

either destroyed or sold. The act of collecting porcelain rapidly became established in the

royal family, with evidence surviving that Henry’s daughter Queen Elizabeth I (1533–

1603) owned porcelain. Porcelain from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s collection has

custom-produced English silver-gilt mounts with hallmarks of silversmiths who worked

during Elizabeth I’s reign. 189 One example dates from the collection of Elizabeth I’s

advisor William Cecil, Lord Burghley (1520-1598) (Figure 51). The blue-and-white

porcelain dating to the Wanli period (1572-1620) is detailed with an animal motif. The

bowl is fitted with an ornate custom silver gilt frame with figural representations forming

the object’s handles. The piece documents the desire for British royalty to procure

Chinese porcelain. The addition of an English silver mount dating to approximately 1585

provides evidence of the appropriation of the porcelain into British culture, emphasizing

dominance over the porcelain itself, since it is held by an object associated with Britain.

These early collections were quite small, including only a few pieces of porcelain.

Collecting itself served more as a form of curiosity than a way of establishing what

scholars would consider a true collection. The inclination to amass large collections

189 Avery, Louise. "Chinese Porcelain in English Mounts." The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Bulletin 2, no. 9 (1944): 266. doi:10.2307/3257145.
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