Period:Ming dynasty Production date:1426-1435
Materials:porcelain
Technique:glazed, underglazed,
Dimensions:Length: 23 centimetres Width: 23 centimetres Depth: 3.50 centimetres
Description:
Two square porcelain floor tiles with underglaze blue decoration. Made from thick slabs of porcelain clay, they are decorated on the upper surface only with stylized motifs painted beneath the glaze in blue cobalt. A ring of classic lappets encircles a central stylized flower head, surrounded by three concentric circles containing overlapping ovals. Along the sides are half-foliage scrolls reserved in white on a blue ground and at the corners quarter-sections of flowers. Four such tiles would complete the pattern.
IMG
![图片[1]-tile BM-1993-1027.1-2-China Archive](https://chinaarchive.net/Ming dynasty/Ceramics/mid_01506381_001.jpg)
![图片[2]-tile BM-1993-1027.1-2-China Archive](https://chinaarchive.net/Ming dynasty/Ceramics/mid_00263841_001.jpg)
Comments:Harrison-Hall 2001:Stylistically the tiles relate to Islamic motifs found on Chinese pilgrim flasks and ‘lianzi’ [lotus-seed] bowls made in the Xuande era. The concentric pattern of overlapping ovals is repeated on a Xuande mark and period covered cloisonne box in the Pierre Uldry Collection. Part of a tile with the same design, but reversed with white decoration on a blue ground, was excavated at Jingdezhen at Dongyuan, Zhushan, in 1993. Other blue-and-white tiles unearthed there confirm that the present tiles were made at the imperial factory in the Xuande era. It is possible that these unusual tiles belong to a group made to order for a Near Eastern customer. In his memoirs the Mughal emperor Babur (died 1525) refers to Timur’s (1336-1405) grandson Ulugh Beg (1394-1449), who served as governor of the provincial Central Asian capital of Samarkand from 1409 and went on to rule the empire in the last two years of his life and who had a ‘chinikhaneh’ [porcelain room] whose walls were faced with imported Chinese tiles. Local potters made blue-and-white tiles in poorer-quality materials in Egypt, Turkey Lebanon and Syria during the first half of the fifteenth century (for an example in the British Museum see BM 1978.0419.1).
Materials:porcelain
Technique:glazed, underglazed,
Dimensions:Length: 23 centimetres Width: 23 centimetres Depth: 3.50 centimetres
Description:
Two square porcelain floor tiles with underglaze blue decoration. Made from thick slabs of porcelain clay, they are decorated on the upper surface only with stylized motifs painted beneath the glaze in blue cobalt. A ring of classic lappets encircles a central stylized flower head, surrounded by three concentric circles containing overlapping ovals. Along the sides are half-foliage scrolls reserved in white on a blue ground and at the corners quarter-sections of flowers. Four such tiles would complete the pattern.
IMG
Comments:Harrison-Hall 2001:Stylistically the tiles relate to Islamic motifs found on Chinese pilgrim flasks and ‘lianzi’ [lotus-seed] bowls made in the Xuande era. The concentric pattern of overlapping ovals is repeated on a Xuande mark and period covered cloisonne box in the Pierre Uldry Collection. Part of a tile with the same design, but reversed with white decoration on a blue ground, was excavated at Jingdezhen at Dongyuan, Zhushan, in 1993. Other blue-and-white tiles unearthed there confirm that the present tiles were made at the imperial factory in the Xuande era. It is possible that these unusual tiles belong to a group made to order for a Near Eastern customer. In his memoirs the Mughal emperor Babur (died 1525) refers to Timur’s (1336-1405) grandson Ulugh Beg (1394-1449), who served as governor of the provincial Central Asian capital of Samarkand from 1409 and went on to rule the empire in the last two years of his life and who had a ‘chinikhaneh’ [porcelain room] whose walls were faced with imported Chinese tiles. Local potters made blue-and-white tiles in poorer-quality materials in Egypt, Turkey Lebanon and Syria during the first half of the fifteenth century (for an example in the British Museum see BM 1978.0419.1).
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