dish BM-1975-1028.12

Period:Ming dynasty Production date:1403-1424
Materials:porcelain
Technique:glazed, incised,
Subjects:dragon lotus
Dimensions:Diameter: 39.30 centimetres Height: 6.50 centimetres

Description:
Large porcelain dish with incised decoration and clear glaze. This large dish has rounded sides and a foot ring which slopes inwards to the unglazed base. Incised in the centre is a dragon depicted with closed jaws, horns, a scaly body and flexed five-clawed paws. In the cavetto is a scroll with eight blooms, alternatively lotus seen in profile and flowers viewed from above. The outside is plain. It is covered inside and out with an even clear glaze lending a milky-white glaze.
IMG


Comments:Harrison-Hall 2001:Dating this dish is by stylistic comparison with the Yongle mark and period bowl with anhua decoration also in the British Museum (see Franks.1). This uses an identical style of depicting the dragon. Such ceramics were made only at the imperial kiln at Zhushan in the Yongle era, possibly for containing water on a Buddhist altar.Two similar dishes were in the Arbedil shrine in Iran. Another similar dish with a gold-lacquer repair to the rim was formerly owned by John Pope.