A VERY RARE BLUE AND WHITE 'THREE FRIENDS OF WINTER' 'SHOU' JAR MARK AND PERIOD OF JIAJING

sturdily potted rising in a gentle curve to high shoulders and a short straight neck with raised lip, the exterior painted in pale shades of cobalt-blue with The Three Friends of Winter motif, depicting bamboo, pine and prunus trees, each with its main trunk twisted in the shape of a large shou character, growing amid smaller stems of lingzhi fungus, all below a ruyi-head band at the shoulder, the base inscribed with the six-character mark in underglaze-blue within a recessed circle in the centre

A similar Jiajing jar is illustrated in Cecile and Michael Beurdeley, La Ceramique Chinoise, Fribourg, 1974, col. pls. 58 and 59; another was sold in our New York rooms, 9/10^th October 1987, lot 281; and a third example was sold at Christie’s London, 13^th December 1976, lot 97, with a related cover.

Sir Harry Garner in Oriental Blue and White, London 1954, notes that Jiajing period ceramics reflect in their motifs the Daoist beliefs of the emperor.  'The emblems of immortality, such as the pine tree, deer and crane are used in various combinations.  A favorite device is the peach tree with its trunk twisted into the form of the symbol of long life (shou). '