Chine de commande - Western Subjects 1680-1800 - Various Subjects - Amorous

Object 2011987

Milk jug

China

1740-1760

Height with cover 131 mm (5.16 inch), height without cover 106 mm (4.17 inch), diameter handle to spout 104 mm (4.09 inch), diameter of mouthrim 40 mm (1.57 inch), diameter of footring 40 mm (1.57 inch), weight including cover 213 grams (8.15 ounce (oz.)), weight cover 31 grams (1.09 ounce (oz.))

Milk jug on footring, pear shaped body with handle, small triangular spout at the rim. The C-shaped handle is placed opposite the spout. Matching cover with pointed knob. Decorated in various overglaze enamels and gold with the 'The Valentine' or 'Alter of Love' pattern, a landscape scene with two love birds bill affectionately as they perch on Cupid's quiver while his bow lies nearby in the front an altar with two flaming hearts,the scene is flanked by a pine or breadfruit tree and garlanded curtains. Round the rim a scroll-and-shell border. The cover is decorated en suite.

According to Motley this is a well known pattern found on a small range of Chinese export pieces. The origins are not clear but it seems to have been done for Lord Anson in 1743 and is based on a drawing by Sir Piercy Brett (c.1710-1781) who was Lieutenant on Anson's flagship HMS Centurion on his voyage round the world. (1740-1744) Anson made Brett captain of the Centurion while they were in Canton, 30 Sept 1743, and he did many drawings of the voyage. The earliest version of this pattern has a breadfruit tree and a palm tree then appear in the centre of an export armorial dinner service with the arms of Anson. In this service the tree has garlands of flowers and many of the elements of this pattern are present: the flaming hearts on the altar, the dog, the shepherd's crook, the birds, the bow and arrows. Sometimes drawn back curtains are added which are very suggestive of an erotic voyeurism, resembling the drapes of a four poster bed. Such use of suggestive array was popular for an eighteenth century audience and would have been readily comprehensible to an educated eighteenth century eye. The use of pastoral imagery and symbolism as code for amorous activities was ubiquitous then. The Valentine design appears on its own in a number of English ceramic wares of the eighteenth century and it was used on Chinese export porcelain, armorial and pseudo-armorial objects as well. (Motley 2014)

Howard states that the idea for the Valentine pattern, by Piercy Brett, was certainly inspired by Anson and Piercy's stay on Tenian Island to collect breadfruit trees for the British West Indian colonies. An illustration in Anson's Voyages shows a very similar breadfruit tree an palm while other allusions are to absent loved ones. The Valentine pattern had a popularity which saw it produced in underglaze blue with hounds and puppies and with Chinese-looking shepherds in European clothes seated beneath pine trees. It was copied at Worcester and elements appear on Chinese snuffbottles and rim cartouches for a decade after the Anson's service. It became in fact part of the repertoire of Chinese workshops in Canton. (Howard 1994)

The Valentine design remained long in vogue; for in 1778 we still find it described as 'a burning altar, and two small doves on a quiver with a bow, and accessories' in the catalogue of a sale held in that year at Amsterdam of the stock of the porcelain-shop of Martha Raap. (Lunsingh Scheurleer 1974, p.158)

For identically, polychrome decorated objects, please see:

For similarly decorated objects, please see:

Condition: Some popped bubbles of glaze to the tip of the spout and a chip with some frits and fleabites to the rim of the cover. A shallow frit to the footring.

References:

Goldsmith Phillips 1956, p.146 & plate 67

Beurdeley 1962,cat. 109

Lunsingh Scheurleer 1974, p.158 & cat. 295

Howard & Ayers 1978, vol. 1, cat. 204, & vol. 2, cat. 355

Hervouët 1986, cat. 7.118 & 7.119

Huitfeldt 1993, p.57 & pp.110-111

Howard 1994, cat. 77-80

Litzenburg 2003, cat. 158

Kerr 2011, pp.65-66 & p.135, nt. 12

Motley 2014, p.82, cat. 61

Price: € 1.249 Currency Converter