Two large Chinese flambé glazed bottle vases, 18th century, ...

Hammer

£8,000

Two large Chinese flambé glazed bottle vases, 18th century, each covered in a purple streaked crimson red crackle-glaze, with mushroom coloured glaze to the rim and interior of the neck, black ink inscription to the unglazed base, 35.8 and 34cm high, occasional tiny glaze flakes

cf. a similarly shaped flambé vase in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, accession no. C.405-1910, dated to the Qianlong period.

More Information

Provenance - UK private collection, 1920s or earlier, thence by family descent.
This collection of late Ming and Qing dynasty porcelain and bronze vessels has been owned by a single Cotswold family for a number of generations dating back to the 1920s or earlier.
The collection was formerly on display at the family home in Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire, UK before the house was sold in the 1980s. Some interior photos taken c.1982 show a number of the pieces on display in the family house and an inventory undertaken in 1948 by the local Campden auctioneer and valuer Alfred Bower lists many of the items. Extracts of the 1948 inventory are included where they correspond to the relevant lots in the sale.

The slightly larger of the two vases has some tiny splinter glaze losses around the shoulder and the edge of the foot. The slightly smaller vase has a few small splinter loss to the glaze, and a few small splinter losses on the inside of the unglazed foot, otherwise both in good condition with no restoration or cracks detected.