Page 277 - The colours of each piece: production and consumption of Chinese enamelled porcelain, c.1728-c.1780

CHAPTER 7 Porcelain Dealers and their Role in Trade

space to pack. It is evident from visual sources that there was a special warehouse

designed for porcelain trade at the end of the eighteenth century. A painting entitled

‘Porcelain Arriving at Canton Warehouse’ shows that a boat of porcelain was about

to be unloaded to the warehouse. (Figure 7-10)

Figure 7-10 A warehouse on the shore of the Pearl River.
The plaque of the warehouse reads Fengyuan Zhanfang, Fengyuan warehouse. Fengyuan

belonged to the Hong merchant 蔡世文 (Munqua) and was used in period between 1760s
and 1780.

However, problems arose towards the end of the eighteenth century. When a

Hong merchant experienced bankruptcy, this debt had to be paid by the porcelain

dealers who registered with this Hong merchant. For example, in 1779, a Hong

merchant Coqua went bankrupt and his debts were actually collected from the keepers

of porcelain shops. According to the Dutch source, twenty porcelain dealers had to

raise money for him. As an exchange, these dealers were allowed to divide his stocks

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