Page 41 - Chinese Export Porcelain Art, MET MUSEUM 2003

as early as about 1715, the date of a service
owned by the Horsemanden family, some
of whom settled in New York (fig. 12). Other
early examples include porcelains for the
Higginson family of Salem, Massachusetts,
and for the Clarke family of New York City,
the former dating to the early 1730s and the
latter to 1735. Plates from a service made
for Samuel Vaughan (1720-1802) of Boston,
London, and Jamaica, which date to about
1750, are embellished with his coat of arms

(fig. 39).
The popularity of armorial designs grew
over the ensuing decades, as large person-
alized services appealed to American mer-
chants eager to profit from a trade that had
been dominated by the British East India
Company. During the American Revolution
and the years immediately following it,
commerce for Chinese goods through Great
Britain was curtailed. However, shortly after
the United States signed the Treaty of Paris
in 1783, signaling the country's ultimate
independence, a group of four enterprising
businessmen from Philadelphia and New
York formed a syndicate that would embark
on direct trade with China for the first time.
America's entry into trade with China was
equally fortuitous for the Chinese, who
had experienced a drastic decline in busi-
ness from England and the Continent,
where domestic products had achieved a
Saucer, detail ofarmorial competitive edge.

The Empress of China, with a cargo of
42. Saucer. Chinese (American market), ca. 1785-88. Hard paste. Diam. 3I/2 in. ginseng from Maryland and Virginia, furs
(8.9 cm). Rogers Fund, 1936 (36.52.2)
from the northern states and Canada, and
lead, wine, tar, and silver dollars, sailed
H. Giles
This saucer was madeforJames ofNew York, lieutenant in the artillery
during the Revolutionary War. Giles's was evidently sent to Chinafor the from New York Harbor on February 22, 1784,
bookplate
artists to copy. The result is a richly ornamented Rococo armorial with scrolls and lion bound for Canton (Guangzhou). She was
rampant. The patriotic pseudo-armorial displays both theAmericanflag and the motto captained by John Green of Philadelphia,
Libertas et Patria Mea (Myfreedom and my country). The tea bowlfor this saucer and her ship's agent, or supercargo, was
has a simplfied decoration the crest with thefamily initials.
consisting only of
Bostonian Samuel Shaw (1754-1794),

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