To the right of the chickens, I see leaves that appear to me to be rose leaves.

And I wonder if the blooms with the leaves are early now-lost chinas.

Ingrid

Ingrid, even though it's rare, do you collect any Chinese porcelain with roses? (Peonies sure are gorgeous, too.) I read somewhere that a rose resembling Old Blush is painted on a 2000 yr old piece.

Carol

I have an feel that this was a bonsai rose, except the Chinese invented bonsai and their had a different feel than 'modern' bonsai that mostly follows Japanese rules.

The massive base looks to me like an old rose that's pushing out flowers as it is able.

For a look at Chinese penjing, this link looks good. I've only just begun to go through it.

Interesting, too -- and hard to wrap one's mind around -- that this refined and beautiful rooster cup was made only about 100 years after the appearance in Europe of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, which coincidentally includes the mock-heroic one of the rooster Chanticleer (animal tales a world-wide phenomenon, possibly going back to India?).

Carol, I looked at my porcelain collection and saw only two definite depictions of roses. However, when the Chinese began to export porcelain to Europe and the U.S. they began to adapt their style to what they thought the "devil foreigners" would like and began to copy flowers from European porcelain manufacturers, especially Meissen in Germany, who became famous for their "Deutsche Blumen" (German flowers) which included roses. Export ware from the 1700's on did include roses, but for their own uses the Chinese paid the rose scant attention. Still, the bush on this old and very famous cup does seem to represent roses. The Chinese were very fond of symbolism and many flowers and animals (which famously include dragons, which were revered) were symbolic of certain qualities, and that probably includes the rooster and chickens, although I don't know what that would be (big gaps in my knowledge of Chinese porcelain, which is an incredibly complex field).

Ingrid

"A bold rooster struts vainly through a garden of prayer stones and red flowers while a pragmatic hen snatches up bugs with her beak. Around the pair is a little flock of endearing chicks. The scene is almost exactly copied on the opposite side."

He continues:

"The cup was made in the Ming dynasty during the reign of Emperor Chenghua (1447-1487). Emperor Chenghua was the father of the renowned and righteous Hongzhi Emperor whose reign was a high water mark for the Ming. The story of Emperor Hongzhi’s boyhood however is one of terror and fear. The young crown prince was nearly snuffed out by the infamous Lady Wan, an imperial concubine of Emperor Chenghua who tried to consolidate power by surreptitiously killing off all of the emperor’s male heirs (and all of his other favorite concubines to boot). The turmoil and corruption at court spread far and wide."

Ferrebeekeeper has no doubt Hongzhi's traumatic boyhood played a part in his decision, unique among Chinese emperors, to be a faithful husband of only one wife. Unfortunately, Hongzhi's heir turned out to be a bad ruler, as sometimes happens with the sons of virtuous princes (vide Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius and his son Commodus). He is delighted to think that the flowers may depict a long lost Ming rose.

As for myself, having learned a bit more about their historical and cultural background, I will now look upon the China roses with renewed interest and respect.

Ingrid