Of oval form supported on four ball-and-claw feet, the notched rim above a pair of ring handles applied atop chrysanthemum bosses, enameled at each side with a sinuous tree growing from rocks and bearing fruit and fantastical flowers, its bark painted in gilt, the crenellations above painted with alternating peony and chrysanthemum sprays and bordered with iron-red cell pattern, the lower edge with iron-red diaper pattern, the interiors of the crenellations and sides painted with swimming carp, their scales alternating gilt and iron-red, the center of the basin painted a large fish amid seaweed, crustaceans and smaller fish
21⁵⁄₈ in. (55 cm.) wide

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Lot Essay

In a rare form encountered much more frequently as small, circular bowls made for icing wineglasses, this monumental monteith basin must have been intended for the chilling of whole bottles. The smaller form appears in English silver of the 1680s, named—according to legend—after an eccentric Scottish lord named Monteigh, who wore his cloak hem notched in this fashion. By about 1710, the Dutch were producing monteith bowls in Delftware. The claw and ball feet of the present example may have derived from mahogany furniture examples which came into use from around 1715.

Several other monumental oval Chinese export porcelain monteiths are known. One pair, from the collection of a European noble family and exhibited in Buenos Aires, Museo Nacional de Arte Decorativo, Porcelanas Compania de las Indias, 1969, cat. 153 and 154, was sold by Christie's, London, 16 December 1996, lot 293. Another pair was sold by Christie's, New York, 23 January 2001, lot 29. A pair once held in the Collection of Schloss Wernigerode, Sachsen-Anhalt was sold by Sotheby's, Amsterdam, 17 December, 2008, lot 135. A pair acquired by King George IV in 1829 remains in the Royal Collection (inv. no. 58938), and resides at Clarence House. A single example is currently on display among the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (accession no. 1974.369.8), formerly in the collection of Mrs. Harry Payne Bingham.

The above group are all strikingly similar, and may have been made as part of a single order, intended to stand around the perimeters of a great European dining hall. For an additional related example with variant decoration, a single verte-Imari monteith, of similar scale but with floral decoration and without handles or feet, the piece sold by Sotheby's, Monaco, 5 March 1989, lot 331.