Zhangzhou (Swatow) wares 1570-1650 - Dishes - Polychrome - Page 1

Object 2011384

Dish

(Southeast) China, Zhangzhou (Swatow). Probably from Anxi, Fujijan province.

1570-1650

Provenance: Formerly in the collection of the famous Dutch author, journalist and adventurer; Johan J. Fabricius (1899-1981). The dish was presented as a gift by, Anneke (Anna) Cornelia Bleeker (Fabricius widow), to her friend Mrs. Tine Kruijt - de Kroes (1930-2012). Both ladies were members of a society studying 'wild plants'.

Height 63 mm (2.48 inch), diameter of rim 295 mm (11.61 inch), diameter of footring 107 mm (4.21 inch), weight 820 grams (28.93 ounce (oz.))

Dish on footring, flaring sides, ridged and out-turned at the edge. Polychrome decorated with overglaze iron-red and green and black overglaze enamels with a floral spray in a double concentric band, encircled by a biscuit ring painted green with black scrolls and dashes. On the sides and rim four ogival medallions, edged with green and black and filled with floral sprays in red and green separated by other sprays, outlined in red over a striated, red background. The reverse is undecorated. Covered with a crackled cream-white glaze.

In 1979, Harrisson states in her 'Swatow' that fragments of this ware have turned up, among Swatow and other fragments, in refuse of the historic Dutch East India Company, (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie, VOC), anchorage west of Tanjong Priok at Jakarta. In his 1964 study, Miedema recorded this ware as related to Swatow in style, and suggested it may have originated from a minor kiln in the vicinity of Amoy. What he described is here referred to Southeast Asia with confidence, even though kiln-sherds of this material have not, so far, been identified. The physical and stylistic properties of this ware is closer to Vietnam than to China.

Twenty year later; in 1999, Adhyatman states in her 'Zhangzhou (Swatow) Ceramics. Sixteenth to Seventeenth Centuries Found in Indonesia' that often found with Swatow ware as surface finds are ceramics in freely painted designs in underglaze blue and overglaze enamels. They are found at the Pasar Ikan, an old VOC harbour near Jakarta, and in Banten, West Java. In style they are reminiscent of Swatow ware, although they have a different body. At a ceramic symposium of wares from Fujian held in Singapore in April 1998, Mr. Ye Qinglin from the Anxi Museum showed a fragment of a blue and white dish, as a product of the Anxi kilns from the late Ming to early Qing. The origin of these wares is thus established. The stoneware body is brittle, porous and of a creamish-white colour. Dishes have a relatively narrow foot and flaring sides with an angled and down-turned rim forming a ridge on the underside. The exterior is always plain and the base can be glazed or unglazed. The footring, slanting on the exterior, straight on the interior, has straight edge with adherence of glaze smudges. In the interior is an unglazed biscuit ring. In polychrome specimens this is painted green with black scrolls. The transparent glaze is normally crackled with pinholes. The enamels include red, a vivid lime green, a dull sepia or aubergine and black.

For identically decorated dishes, please see:

For a similarly decorated dish, please see:

Zhangzhou (Swatow) Ceramics. Sixteenth to Seventeenth Centuries Found in Indonesia, (S. Adhyatman, The Ceramic Society of Indonesia, 1999), p.185, cat. 257a & 257b.

Willem Ysbrandtszoon Bontekoe (1587-1657) was a skipper with the Dutch East India Company (VOC), who made only one voyage for the company (1618–1625). On a voyage to Java a fire, caused by a shipmate accidentally setting fire to a cask of brandy, caused the gunpowder magazine to explode and sink the ship. 72 sailors, including Bontekoe survived in two lifeboats. First they continued their journey in these two boats but later they went on together in one. Sails were made from the shirts of the crew. They were hungry and thirsty; some drank seawater or urine. Bontekoe did the latter too, until it became too concentrated. Sometimes there was relief by being able to catch birds and flying fish, and by rain supplying drinking water. The hunger became so severe again that the crew decided to soon kill the ship boys. Bontekoe writes that he was against that, and that they agreed that they would wait three more days. Just in time, 13 days after the ship wreck, they reached land where they could eat coconuts. It was an island in the Sunda Strait, 15 miles of Sumatra. They went on to Sumatra, where they encountered locals from whom they could first buy food, but who later attacked them. Eleven crew members were killed. 57 survivors encountered a Dutch fleet of 23 ships near Java under the command of Frederik de Houtman, which saved them from going to the now hostile Bantam. Divided over the ships they reached Batavia on Java, where Bontekoe was received by Jan Pierszoon Coen, who gave Bontekoe a new command and an order to harass the Chinese coast. In 1625 Bontekoe returned to Holland. After his return, he settled down in Hoorn to live a quiet life. Bontekoe might have been forgotten had he not written his journal. This journal/book is about his voyage with the Nieuw Hoorn, the shipwreck, the adventurous voyage to Java in lifeboats, and his subsequent years of service in East Asia, It was first published in 1646 and was a bestseller in the 17th and 18th centuries. The first part of the journal became the basis of the very popular children's book by Johan Fabricius, De Scheepsjongens van Bontekoe (1923; 'The Ship Boys of Bontekoe' or 'The Cabin Boys of Bontekoe'). (source: Wikipedia)

Johan Johannes Fabricius (August 24, 1899 – June 21, 1981) was a Dutch author, journalist and adventurer. Fabricius was born in Bandung Java. At the beginning of the Second World War in 1940, Fabricius moved to England to work as a newsreader. After the Second World War Fabricius worked as a correspondent for the BBC and The Times in Asia. He wrote approximately 60 books, among them many books for children. He is well known for writing the historical children's book 'De scheepsjongens van Bontekoe'', 'The Ship Boys of Bontekoe' or 'The Cabin Boys of Bontekoe' (1923), which was reprinted 28 times as of 2003. In 1956 he returned to The Netherlands. After the death of his first wife Ruth Freudenberg, Fabricius remarried in 1968 with Anneke (Anna) Cornelia Bleeker. Johan Fabricius died in 1981 at the age of 81 in Glimmen. (source: Wikipedia)

Condition: Two hairlines to the rim.

References:

Miedema 1964, cat. S226

Woodward 1974, cat. 21

Harrisson 1979, cat. 245 & 245a

Adhyatman 1999, cat. 257a & 257b

Price: € 699 Currency Converter