343.
A BLUE-GLAZED AND GILT-DECORATED VASE AND COVER, ZHUANGUAN
Qing dynasty, Qianlong period, mid 18th century
22 cm high
Provenance: Naples, Villa della Floridiana, Museo Duca di Martina, Placido de Sangro (1829-1891) collection.
inv. n. 4621.
The decoration on this vase consists of butterflies and gourds joined together by the long tendrils of the vegetables.
Gourds (gua), like other fruits and vegetables with many seeds, are symbols of fertility. The wish for a numerous progeny of the decoration on this vase is further emphasized by the presence of tendrils, known in Chinese as wan which is homophone of the word which means “ten thousands”. Even the presence of butterflies could be interpreted as an intensifier of this symbology: the second character which composes the word hudie which means butterfly has in fact the same sound of the term die that could be translated as “repeatedly”.
The form of this vase seems to derive from majolica drug jars used in the Mediterranean area already from the late Medieval period, known in Italian with the word of albarello. This shape – known as zhuanguan, which could be translated as “robust jar” – has been in the repertory of Chinese ceramists from the early Ming dynasty, frequently adopted also during the eighteenth century. It is known that a number of vessels of this shape were committed by the emperor Qianlong in 1748.
