Description:
Chinese export porcelain, batavia ware teacup with a deep hemispherical body with a slight flare at the rim with the exterior of the cup covered with lustrous brown slip, and the interior painted in black with delicate border of overlapping curves, and dots and three black floral sprigs with large floral and butterfly motif and traces of gilding in the center. "M158" is on the bottom.and small, high circular foot rim. This brown-glazed export porcelain is sometimes called Batavia ware or Batavia brown after the Dutch East India Company settlement and trading post of Batavia (modern-day Jakarta, Indonesia) from which most of it was shipped to Europe. The exterior iron-brown wash was popular on inexpensive export china made from the late 17th through the mid-18th century. During the period the color was referred to as "cafe au lait," "brown," "the color of dead leaves," and even "cow dung." This brown glaze ranged from a light to a dark brown, can be left undecorated; decorated with a thin watery gilding; or with reserve panels often shaped like a fan or a leaf showing the underlying white porcelain body embellished with floral designs. The interiors were often decorated in underglaze blue or overglaze enamels. These sturdy wares may have been referred to in VOC records as "coffee house wares" intended for coffee houses and taverns. These wares are also found in the American context. Nancy Carlisle's "Cherished Possessions: A New England Legacy" illustrates a dummy board depicting Batavian ware ceramics on a tray and Batavian ware ceramics (not shown) that descended in the family of Elizabeth Wendell Smith (1716-1799) of Boston and Falmouth, Maine; and Joyce Geary Volk's "The Warner House" shows a Batavia ware bowl owned by the the socially prominent Warner family of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. See similar teacup and saucer (HD 2011.4.1-.2).
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+87.038 |
