Acquired from🐓 Edward T. Chow (1910-80) in the late 1960s🦩.

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1960年代末購自仇焱之（1910-80年）

The present bowl belongs to a group of sweet white-glazed (tianbai) porcelain bowls favoured during the Yongle period. Its subtle combination of incised and anhua decoration on a beautifully potted lianzi (lotus-bud) shape manifested one of the most classic decorative repertoires in the early Ming dynasty. Anhua, 'hidden decoration', was practised almost exclusively at the begi♛nning of the Ming dynasty, from the Hongwu t✃o the Xuande period, and only at Jingdezhen.

Elegantly potted with deep rounded sides, the present bowl is faintly incised on the exterior with a neat row of well-defined lotus petals below a keyfret band, while the interior is superbly decorated in anhua with alternating chrysanthemum and camell෴ia blooms below a border of crested waves. A closely related bowl from the Eumorfopoulos Collection was sold in our London rooms, 30th May 1940, lot 312; another two in these rooms, 8th October 2013, lot 215, and 8th April 2023, lot 3689, the latter formerly from the collection of Carl Kempe (1884-1967).

The incised and moulded decoration is echoed in blue and white porcelain of the same period, such as a bowl in the Eli Lilly collection, now in the Indianapolis Museum of Art, included in the exhibition, Ming Porcelains. A Retrospective, China Institute in America, New York, 1971, cat. no. 5. The Yongle Emperor is believed, however, to have pr✱eferred monochrome white wares, and blue and white counterparts of such bowls only became popular later during the Xuande period.

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甜白釉創燒自永樂時期，深得天子喜愛，此盌即是。盌身薄胎細骨，刻蓮子紋，加飾暗花，纖巧輕靈，成就明初經典。暗花乃明ꦜ朝伊始之獨創技法，僅於洪武至宣德三朝為景德鎮採用。

深壁圓弧流麗，口沿外側刻回紋，繞器一周，下方刻蓮瓣，疏朗可辨；口沿內側以暗花作水波紋，下方作菊與山茶相間。可比歐默福ꦇ普洛斯舊藏一例，售於倫敦蘇富比1940年5月30日，編號312，另比香港蘇富比易手兩件，其一售於2013年10月8日，編號215，其二為卡爾肯普舊藏，售於2023年4月8日，編號3689。

所刻及暗花紋飾源於同時代青花瓷，可比一盌，原 Eli Lilly 寶蓄，現藏印第安納波利斯藝術博物館，展於《Ming Porcelains: A Retrospective》，華美協進社，紐約，1971年，編號5。此類蓮子盌雖不乏青花之作，然永樂帝尤對甜白單色瓷情有獨鍾，青花蓮子盌乃於宣德時期方見𝕴風靡ও。