Page 63 - 2019 October Important Chinese Art Sotheby's Hong Kong

BREWING TEA BY THE HUI SPRING
A FAMILLE-ROSE TEAPOT

FOR THE QIANLONG EMPEROR

The Qianlong Emperor was a fervent tea lover and is said with water from the Hui Spring boiled using this unique
to have composed more than two hundred poems on the brazier. Over many years it became a tradition for scholars
subject of tea. He expressed his appreciation of tea culture to gather on the Hui Mountain to liberate their literati spirit
in his writings and many of his poems make reference to the through drinking tea, writing poems, or painting landscapes.
plucking, processing and preparing of tea. The Chonghua The paintings and writings left by these scholars were later
Dian (Hall of Double Glory) within the Forbidden City was compiled into several scrolls and were given the name Zhulu
the palace hall where the Emperor’s annual tea parties tuyong [Compendium of the ‘Bamboo Brazier’]. These
were held in the first lunar month, and where he invited his scrolls, together with the bamboo brazier, were regarded
Grand Secretaries, ministers and members of the Imperial as the two treasures of the Hui Mountain Temple. During
Academy to accompany him in drinking tea, writing poetry the Qing dynasty, the Qianlong Emperor learned about
and pursuing other leisurely interests. the Hui Spring and the treasures of the Hui Mountain and
visited during his Southern Inspection Tours. He was served
The idyllic outdoor scene on this vessel depicts a scholar
seated in his garden at a stone table before an open tea prepared on the bamboo brazier whilst admiring the
handscrolls, and later composed the poem inscribed on this
handscroll, an attendant serving him tea brewed by a second teapot to commemorate his visit. Upon returning from the
assistant some distance away. Inscribed on the reverse is
an imperial poem, entitled Jihuiquan peng zhulu ge (Brewing south, the Emperor ordered a replica of the Hui Mountain
Tea by Hui Spring), which is included in Qing Gaozong yuzhi retreat to be built in Yuquan Mountain near the Forbidden
City and instructed his workshops to produce a copy of the
shiwen quan ji [Anthology of imperial Qianlong poems], Yuzhi original Ming dynasty bamboo brazier with an imperial poem
shi er ji [Imperial poems, vol. 2], juan 24, p. 4 (fig. 1).
(dated 1751) inscribed to the base. This now resides in the
The painting and the poem celebrate the Qianlong Emperor’s Palace Museum, Beijing.
fondness for the Hui Spring in Wuxi, Jiangsu province and
the legendary bamboo brazier which was used to prepare The original Compendium of the Bamboo Brazier was
tea using water from the spring, both of which had been destroyed by fire in 1779. The following year the Qianlong
Emperor commanded court painters to repaint the scrolls
treasured by scholars for hundreds of years. The pure under his supervision. Upon completion, the Emperor gave
natural spring water from the Hui Mountain, appreciated by
scholars since the Tang dynasty (618-907), was recorded in the new Compendium of the Bamboo Brazier back to the
Chajing [The Classic of Tea] by Lu Yu (733-804), the highly Hui Mountain Temple and ordered that it be stored in a
special room. In addition, he had the paintings and poems
respected ‘Sage of Tea’, who ranked it second among all transferred onto a series of steles, also to be kept in the
natural springs. During the Ming dynasty, a well-known monk
named Pu Zhen, zi Xinghai from the Hui Mountain Temple, temple. In 1860 the Hui Mountain Temple was destroyed by
commissioned artisans from Huzhou, Zhejiang province, to fire, resulting in the loss of all the scrolls. Fortunately, some
of the stele survived, including one engraved with a painting
make a bamboo brazier, and served his guests tea made

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