Page 184 - The colours of each piece: production and consumption of Chinese enamelled porcelain, c.1728-c.1780

CHAPTER 4 Early Eighteenth-century EEIC Porcelain Trade in Canton 1729-c.1740

armorial enamelled services continued to increase, and reached their peak during the

1750s and 1760s, as shown in Figure 4-5.

Enamelled armoiral service of each decade
700
578
600
495
500 441
411
375
400
318
300 236
200 150 146

100

0
1720s 1730s 1740s 1750s 1760s 1770s 1780s 1790s 1800s

Figure 4-5 The number of enamelled armorial porcelain of each decade in the
eighteenth century.
Source: David Howard, Chinese Armorial Porcelain, Vol.2 (London, 2003), p.75

The purchase of armorial porcelain services had to put in special orders, and such

an order was more likely to have been taken by dealers specialising in porcelain trade.

In this case, the EEIC supercargoes relied a good deal on the shopkeepers, who may

have better specialised knowledge of porcelain. At this point, shopkeepers’ roles

became crucial, as they were both suppliers of enamelled porcelain and also played a

role as specialists. The individual items of service tea-pots, cups, saucers and plates

were ordered from different specialised kilns in Jingdezhen, making the coordination

of size and matching decoration. Accordingly, the price paid for the pieces ordered

was quite high. These special orders were carried out by shopkeepers who made a

long journey to Jingdezhen to arrange for the manufacture, and a second journey to

collect them when they were ready.
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