A Famille-Rose Porcelain ‘Emblems of The Eight Immortals’ Snuff Bottle Seal Mark and Period of Jiaqing

Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 28th October 1992, lot 444.

Moss et al., 1996-2009, vol. 6, no. 1216.

Guilding worn from the lip. A tiny chip from the tip of one red ribbon coming out left from the central Buddist Emblem. Small areas of wear to the relief enamels.
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Although the Eight Immortals themselves are absent, they are represented here by their attributes, which would have been so well known that the immortals themselves were incidental to the message as perceived by a mid-Qing audience. This kind of design is called an baxian 暗八仙, which might be translated ‘Implied Eight Immortals’.

This is an extremely rare variation on the popular subject, unusual for the design of the emblems and its monochrome ground. Even the small, compressed spherical form is atypical for Jiaqing moulded-porcelain bottles. In addition, the black enamel used for the mark is very rare for the group. As a rule, where an iron-red mark on a monochrome foot would not work well (as, for instance, on an iron-red monochrome), gold enamel was substituted. Either iron-red or gold would have worked here, raising the question of why black was used. It has been suggested that black reign marks were used at times of imperial mourning, but we have as yet seen no specific proof of this from the imperial records, and there are many indications that it was not a standard rule. Moreover, the colour of mourning in China is white, not black.