A blue and white ko-sometsuke 'pine' foliate dish, Ming dynasty, Tianqi period

Japanese Private Collection, Kyoto.

This style of moulded foliate dish was first seen in imperial wares of the Wanli period. The particularly excellent blue, control of the footrim and the classic Ming glaze indicate an early production for the Japanese market, which conceivably dates this dish to circa 1620.

Compare a related dish, painted with lotus and cranes in the centre, illustrated in Kitaōji Rosanjin, One Hundred Pieces of Kosometsuke, vol. I, Tokyo, 1978, cat. no. 35; another related dish with a lotus flower in the centre is published in Illustrated Catalogue of Tokyo National Museum: Chinese Ceramics, Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, 1965, cat. no. 466; another related dish with a landscape scene in the centre is illustrated in Sir Michael Butler and Caromy Hoare, Chinese Porcelain from the Butler Collections, Musée National d’Histoire et d’Arte, Luxembourg, 2008, p. 63; and a further related dish in Julia B. Curtis, Trade Taste & Transformation, Jingdezhen Porcelain for Japan, 1620-1645, China Institute Gallery, New York, 2006, p. 103.