BK19
Further images
Modelled in the form of a wooden butter tub with vertical raised ridges representing wooden slats and two upright pierced lug handles, decorated in shades of underglaze blue with sprays of flowers and leafy tendrils, the cover similarly decorated and formed, the finial modelled as a recumbent dairy cow, one leg raised, the base glazed.
Provenance
Mr. and Mrs. White, Acquired in 1998
Literature
This butter dish and cover was exhibited as part of The Oriental Ceramic Society, China Without Dragons: Rare Pieces from Oriental Ceramic Society Members, London, 2016.
It is illustrated in the accompanying catalogue, p.262, no.157, edited by Regina Krahl. On the subject of the present butter tub and cover, Krahl notes:
'Porcelain butter dishes were produced at Jingdezhen for the European market in many different shapes and designs. The present one, in the shape of a real wooden butter tub with a cow reclining on top, is probably fashioned after a Dutch butter dish of Delft faience'
For comparable examples, refer to D.F Lunsingh Scheurleer, Chine de Commande, Hilversum, 1966, pl. 107 (for a butter tub with a seated dog as a knob, from the collection fo the Gemeentelijk Museum het Princessehof, Leeuwarden); and The Nanking Cargo, Chinese Export Porcelain and Gold, Christie's Amsterdam, 28 April - 2 May 1986, lots 4229-575 (for circular and oval butter tubs in various shapes and designs, but none with a figurative knob, from the wreck of the Geldermalsen, which sank in 1752).
