A FINE BLUE AND WHITE DOUBLE-GOURD BIRDFEEDER MARK AND PERIOD OF XUANDE

elegantly potted in the form of a double-gourd with one side of the bulbs cut open to reveal the well-rounded interiors, fitted with two small loops handles on the exterior further delicately painted in bright tones of cobalt-blue demonstrating characteristic 'heaping and piling' with various flowers including lotus, peony and chysanthemum amidst scrolling stems and foliage, the larger bulb inscribed with a horizontal six-character reign mark, the rims encircled by double-line borders

Sotheby's Hong Kong, 25th April 2004, lot 100.

A related double-gourd bird-feeder, but decorated with leafy vines, in the Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, is illustrated in Mingdai guanyao ciqi [Ming Imperial Porcelain], Shanghai, 2007, pl. 1-34; and another, in the T.Y. Chao collection, was sold in our Hong Kong rooms, 11th May 1983, lot 96, and again, 19th May 1987, lot 237.  

Double vessels appear to have been produced from as early as the Neolithic period and may have served as the inspiration for later porcelain varieties, which gradually evolved into the popular and auspicious double-gourd shape. See a Neolithic double jar, included in the Inaugural Exhibition. Chinese Ceramics, vol. 1, The Museum of East Asian Art, Bath, 1993, cat. no. 1; and a qingbai example attributed to the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368), in the Shanghai Museum, illustrated in Stacey Pierson, Qingbai Ware. Chinese Porcelain of the Song and Yuan Dynasties, London, 2002, pl. 95.