Page 289 - Chinese Porcelain Vol II, Galland

BLUE AND WHITE. 381

with olive enamel, while the raised of white
rings porcelain
appear on each. This may really be a late Kang-he piece.
Blue and White with Coloured Enamels.
We now come to a
typical Yung-ching piece ; the porcelain
and about the most
everything it is excellent. Showing
careful in it is a beautiful
manipulation, every respect example
of the skill with which
they blended blue under the glaze
with other colours over the It also exhibits one of the
glaze.
leading characteristics of this period, in that the decoration at
the back is in the same as on the front, as shown
every repect
in the illustration.
Nos. 652, 653. Dish. Diameter, 10^ inches ; height, 2
"
inches. Mark, Yung-ching," in two blue rings. Inside
there are two blue circles at the the sides left
edge, being
then two more blue circles which contain a
perfectly plain,
lovely scroll-work in blue, the small leaves on which are filled
in with enamel which the blue
green through tracing shows,
as in the case of the verte of this The flowers are
period.
drawn and shaded in red, the middle in blue with
part being
a centre with red, with seven
yellow speckled green points
traced in blue. Outside (see No. 652) this decoration covers
the whole of the rise, it requiring eight flowers to do so.
Inside the centre is decorated and the margin left plain ; out-
side the process is reversed, the centre being left plain and
the decorated. The date-mark in the middle is as
margin
written as the rest of the decoration is
carefully painted.
"
Mr. Hippisley, at p. 425, says, Under the earlier emperors
of the the decoration was marked
present dynasty, though
wealth of detail and far artistic skill
by greater by greater
than at any previous time, it remained in essential character
the same. On Chien-lung porcelain, however, it exhibits a
decided towards the
tendency styles of Western decoration,
in some cases a close resemblance to the foliate orna-
showing
mentation which so a in the illumination
plays important part
of mediseval missals, in others to the which are
designs usually
considered Persian or arabesque in their origin." We may
take this as true of the Yung-ching period also, for the
being
reader will have no in in the decoration of
difficulty seeing
this dish the resemblance to the painting on parchment as