Page 238 - The colours of each piece: production and consumption of Chinese enamelled porcelain, c.1728-c.1780

CHAPTER 6 A New Context of Porcelain Trade 1760-1770

of the enamelled porcelain trade, and asks how it would be possible during the 1760s

when the number of porcelain dealers decreased.

Owing to the absence of Canton consultation books in the 1760s, we do not have

any consecutive trading contracts of the EEIC. The Seven Years War (1756-1763)

between Britain and France caused another gap in the absence of records. I use the

data from the VOC collected by Jörg. But it should be noted here that the EEIC trade

did not stop at this period, and the private trade of porcelain constituted the largest

part of the EEIC’s porcelain trade. Some of the cargoes did not even carry any

55
porcelain on the company’s account. For private trade, we only have the number
of the porcelain chests, without details about the contents. According to Geoffrey A.

Godden, Christie’s Manson & Woods still hold some sales records relating to private

trade. But he did not provide any reference about this which made the trace of these

records impossible.

Figure 6-3 shows a striking curve of the VOC’s enamelled porcelain trade during

the 1750 and 1780. Figure 6-4 depicts the total number of imported enamelled

porcelain by the EEIC during 1750 and 1777. The most striking phenomenon that can

be observed from these figures in the development of porcelain trade at Canton from

the 1760 onwards was the tremendous increase in the total pieces of enamelled

porcelain.

55 Geoffrey A. Godden, Oriental Market Porcelain and Its Influence on European Wares (London:
Granada, 1979), p.78.
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