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Description

Bowl with steep sides and raised foot ring. Decoration is in blue on grey-white ground. Interior has two blue bands at edge of bottom and a Chinese character incised into the glaze near the centre; exterior has flower and bamboo design over a 120 degree area with a single Chinese character and a small circle in the remaining surface.

History Of Use

Wealthier families owned groups of dishes of this general type, as did lineages, to have on hand for banquets held on festive occasions such as the marriage of a son. They were used for the serving of special festival foods such as stewed pork and stewed mushrooms, or, in the case of smaller, deeper bowls such as this one, for guests to eat out of. Few families were able to own a set of this size, but they would loan them to others and replace them if they were broken. After the mid-twentieth century the New Territories of Hong Kong began to undergo fundamental changes. The people who had been settled there before 1898, when the British colonizers claimed the area, began to give up rice agriculture and coastal fishing, turning instead to wage labour and increased employment overseas. By the end of the century, educational opportunities leading to the possibility of white-collar work also increased, together with western influences. These changes meant that objects and clothing once useful and appropriate were no longer needed and generally were discarded. Some were saved by their owners, who sometimes were willing to donate them to museums, sharing, also, their knowledge of how they were made and used. As people became wealthier and as many moved from village housing, most banquets have come to be held in restaurants. This bowl possibly was made in the well-known kilns at Wun Yiu, Tai Po.

Narrative

This bowl, and many other objects in this collection, was collected from the abandoned agricultural village of Tsing Fai Tong, in Tsuen Wan District, Hong Kong. The village, like many others in remote and mountainous areas of Hong Kong, had been abandoned because life there was not economically viable in contemporary Hong Kong. Its former inhabitants, members of the Fu lineage, had moved down to the coastal area of Sham Tseng. Elizabeth Johnson collected the objects from the ruined houses with the permission of the Fu lineage, obtained through the intercession of the District Officer, James Hayes. As Hong Kong’s New Territories modernized it was common for people to discard objects that were no longer useful. Hakka people are one of the two original land-dwelling groups that settled the area that became the New Territories of Hong Kong. Their spoken language, and some customs, differed from those of the other original group, the Cantonese or Punti. The Cantonese arrived first and settled on the best rice-growing lands, while the Hakka began to arrive after the late 17th century and settled the more hilly lands.

Item History

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