18th century
The copper saucer dish is painted in blue enamel on a white ground with a central square panel enclosing part of a building behind a crenellated wall half concealed behind clouds. above a ship sailing on rough crested waves. On the right top corner of the panel is a four-lined poem followed by two seals. The panel is surrounded by two phoenixes above and below and two dragons to the right and the left, all below a key-fret border encircling the rim.
The base has a four-character mark 'Da Qing Nian Zhi" (Made during the Great Qing Dynasty), within a double square below three stylised dragons amongst clouds encircling the rim.
Diameter 17.5 cm
It is rare to find painted enamel objects in blue on a white ground, which probably imitates blue and white porcelain.
The poem may be translated as:
Majestic and sky-piercing the Pavillion of Prince Teng gazes out across the riverside
Jade pendants and chiming chariot bells have long since fallen silent
At morning, its painted beams seem to lift into the clouds along the southern shore
And at dawn its beaded curtains stir in the wind and rain sweeping down from the western mountain
The poem may be interpreted as follows:
The Pavilion of Prince Teng occupies an excellent and prominent position, yet who still comes here to visit and admire it today? The prince who built the pavilion has long passed away. In the past, he (and his guests) arrived in a carriage fitted with bells that produced rhythmic chimes as it moved, and he wore jade ornaments at his waist that struck against each other with a clear, ringing sound as he walked. He held lavish banquets in the pavilion, but scenes of such splendor have completely disappeared.
This poem is by a very famous Tang poet, Wang Bo 王勃 (649-676AD). He is especially famous for Tengwang Ge Xu 滕王閣序 ("Preface to
a Poem on the Prince of Teng's Pavilion")
The poem on this plate is the first part of Tengwang Ge Shi 騰王閣詩 ("Poem on the Prince of Teng's Pavilion"; originally eight sentences; this plate contains the first four).
Tengwang Ge 滕王閣 (The Pavilion of Prince Teng) is a building in the North West of the city of Nanchang, in Jiangxi province, China, on the east bank of the Gan River, and is one of the Three Great Towers of southern China.
It was first built in 653 AD, by Li Yuanying 李元嬰 (628?-684), the younger brother of Emperor Taizong of Tang. Li Yuanying was enfeoffed as Prince Teng in 639, and in 652, he was assigned the governorship of Nanchang, where the pavilion served as his townhouse.
