Title
Plate with the Pseudo Coat of Arms of a Tea Merchant
Creator
Made in Jingdezhen, China
Date
about 1745
Label
#3409
Plate with the Pseudo Coat of Arms of a Tea Merchant
Made in Jingdezhen, China, about 1745
Made of Hard-Paste Porcelain
Gift of Bruce C. Perkins
2015.22.1
Some people who did not have a coat of arms but who wanted the social status that comes from having personalized porcelain made up a coat of arms using their business trade cards, tools or other symbols that were significant to them.
That is what the now-unknown owner of this plate did, creating a very personal statement of his rise to wealth. This plate was almost certainly made for a tea merchant, who decorated his shield with a scene of a Chinese worker packing tea in a chest (which was done by tamping it down by foot) and made his crest a European merchant sampling a basket of tea leaves.
This piece is on display in the Chinese Armorial Gallery in the Reeves.
Plate with the Pseudo Coat of Arms of a Tea Merchant
Made in Jingdezhen, China, about 1745
Made of Hard-Paste Porcelain
Gift of Bruce C. Perkins
2015.22.1
Some people who did not have a coat of arms but who wanted the social status that comes from having personalized porcelain made up a coat of arms using their business trade cards, tools or other symbols that were significant to them.
That is what the now-unknown owner of this plate did, creating a very personal statement of his rise to wealth. This plate was almost certainly made for a tea merchant, who decorated his shield with a scene of a Chinese worker packing tea in a chest (which was done by tamping it down by foot) and made his crest a European merchant sampling a basket of tea leaves.
This piece is on display in the Chinese Armorial Gallery in the Reeves.
Credit Line
Gift of Bruce C. Perkins
Citation
Made in Jingdezhen, China, “Plate with the Pseudo Coat of Arms of a Tea Merchant,” Museums at Washington and Lee University: Online Exhibits, accessed May 17, 2024, https://exhibits-museums.omeka.wlu.edu/items/show/302.