Spill vase
Category
Ceramics
Date
1800 - 1900
Materials
hard-paste porcelain, overglaze enamels
Measurements
110 mm (Height)
Place of origin
Jingdezhen
Order this imageCollection
Hill Top, Cumbria
NT 641409
Summary
Spill vase, hard-paste porcelain, cylindrical in form, the foot rim wiped clean of glaze, China, C19th; painted in overglaze famille rose coloured enamels with the figure of a woman dancing and an elderly man crouching holding an object on a cushion, plain band of gilt at rim, Chinese dynasty symbol on base in red.
Full description
The object is a spill vase, which held short splints of wood or paper tapers (called spills) that were used to take a light from a fire. Research into the collection of ceramics at Hill Top by has not revealed any evidence for purchases of ceramics by Beatrix Potter, but there are other types of primary written evidence – for example, letters, journal entries and inventories – that we can draw upon to help build a picture of how her collection was formed and what she liked. A probate inventory of her London family home, Bolton Gardens, was made in June 1914 following the death of her father, Rupert Potter (BP SOC 30/10). While this is frustratingly but typically vague in places, there is enough there to identify several pieces that would eventually make the northward move from London to Hill Top – either directly, or perhaps through Beatrix’s mother, Helen, who moved to the Lake District in 1915. The Bolton Gardens inventory gives the impression of a collection of ceramics befitting a wealthy, polite Victorian family and offers a sense of the ceramics and other objects that would have surrounded Beatrix as he grew up. From British manufacturers there is Wedgwood, Worcester, Minton, Leeds and transfer printed earthenware – everything from monogrammed dinner services to a broken Lowestoft teacup. Chinese and Japanese porcelain also formed part of the family collection. From the drawing room of her parent’s home, a Worcester dessert basket (NT641447), a pair of Wedgwood ‘peony’ pattern plates (NT641370) and a Meissen style tea bowl (NT641563) would eventually make their home at Hill Top. None of these would naturally be considered as furnishings for a Lake District farmhouse, but were clearly held onto because of the meaning they had for Beatrix – and she was especially fond of Wedgwood. A nineteenth century German double salt or sweetmeat dish (NT641470) and this Chinese spill vase were also treasured pieces from her parents (1). The Bolton Gardens inventory also lists ‘Bretaigne ware…decorated fleur-de-lys etc. in blue’, which are probably the examples of tin-glazed Quimper pottery in the collection at Hill Top (e.g., NT641552-3). (1) The object is listed in BP SOC 30/10, page 16, ‘Chinese enamelled porcelain spill vases, decorated in figures’.
Marks and inscriptions
(Chinese dynasty symbol on base)