BFE 09 A small blue and white dish

明 青花螭龍紋盤

Ming dynasty, Late 16th century 

The small dish has rounded sides and everted rim.
It is painted in the centre with a coiling chi dragon with long straight manes within a double line circle below a cross-hatch border encircling the rim. The base has a fu sealmark.
Diameter 13.8 cm

A very similar but smaller dish in the Topkapi Saray Museum Museum is inset in the centre with a red jewel with spiralling inlaid gold leaves. It belonged to a number of ceramics decorated with inlays of precious and semi-precious stones set in gilt metal or gold. These pieces had been jewelled in the palace and kept in the various treasuries.
See Regina Krahl, Chinese Ceramics in the Topkapi Saray Museum II, pl. 1826

BFE 09 明 青花螭龍紋盤
時代：明朝，16世紀晚期。
特徵：盤緣外展，盤心中央畫有一隻盤繞的螭龍。底部可見一方框「福」字底款。
尺寸：直徑13.8公分。