Straits Chinese Celadon-Ground Offering Dishes

Pictures below are the three Straits Chinese celadon-ground offering dishes from my collection. They are usually over-glaze polychrome enamelled porcelains made in Jingdezhen, in the Jiangxi province of China for the Straits Settlements. These Nyonya dishes were mainly reserved for festive occasions and special functions as offering dishes for use on the household altar. They were used to offer citrus fruits and other similar items to the family's ancestors.

These celadon-ground offering dishes are in the form of ogival, ba gua and petal shapes which cupped at the edges to form a bowl. The bowls are decorated with butterflies, birds, peony and other blooms which traditionally, they were associated with courage and representing summer. The dishes are sitting on a ring-foot with the external side of the foot also being decorated.

Dish 1
Ogival-shaped dish.
Size : 22cm x 14.5cm, Height : 5cm

Dish 1

Dish 1

Dish 2
Ba gua-shaped dish.
In Chinese ba means the number 8 and gua means trigram, thus the term ba gua (八卦)
signifies the 8 trigrams. Ba gua is used in Taoist cosmology to represent the fundamental principles of reality, seen as a range of eight interrelated concepts.
Size : 18cm x 18cm, Height : 4cm

Dish 2
The base is with an unclear mark, which is probably a reign mark.

Dish 2

Dish 3
Petal-shaped dish.
The base is marked with a reign mark.
Size : 17cm x 17cm, Height : 6.5cm

Dish 3

Dish 3