According to the 1733 Specification von Porcilan, Cassidy-Geiger, 1996, p.122 a listing of the Meissen porcelains ordered for the Japanese Palace, though not necessarily produced, 'Room 4', the middle room in the east wing enfilade of the main (upper) floor was to include wares and vases of 'Dunckel-Blau Couleur, mit weissen Feldern und schmahlen golden-Rändgen, eingefast auch wenigen Mahlerey...', [Dark-blue colour, with white reserves framed in gold, also with a little painting...]. The room was flanked by smaller rooms dedicated solely to yellow or purple ground porcelain respectively.

The large order of dark-blue-ground porcelain included 3 garnitures (sets) of five vases, 8 garnitures of seven vases and 5 garnitures of five vases, 96 individual vases, 62 beaker vases and vast numbers of smaller table wares. The measurement of the present vases (15 Zoll) does not correspond exactly with the vases listed in the order, though they may have formed part of one of the garnitures with centerpieces 1 Elle/22 Zoll high. One can speculate that the orders were an idealized list which is not reflected in the pieces actually produced for the Japanese Palace.

An unusual feature of the present pair of vases is the alternating shades of different green platforms at the base of the reserved compositions between the larger and smaller cartouches, the significance of which is uncertain and invites further research. One possibility is that painters worked in their own personalized enamel palettes which could indicate two different hands painted these vases. The same feature is seen on a smaller (24 cm) Augustus Rex underglaze blue-ground vase of this form, in the collection of the Porzellansammlung, Dresden, inv. no. PE 1528. Another underglaze blue-ground beaker vase of this form and scale with painting on the front panels attributed to P. E. Schindler, and verso panels to Stadler, was sold at Christie's London, November 27, 2012, lot 96, after being restituted to the Royal House of Wettin in 1999, illustrated in Pietsch, 1996, pp. 210-11, no. 155. A third with figure panels attributed to Stadler remains in the Porzellansammlung, Dresden, inv. no. PE 234; its pair, formerly in the Lesley and Emma Sheafer Collection, is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, a bequest of Emma A. Sheafer in 1973.

Sotheby's would like to thank Anette Loesch for her kind assistance in the cataloguing of this lot.