A 17th Century Chinese Blue and White Porcelain Saucer Shaped Dish, Shunzhi Period 1644 - 1661, Jingdezhen Kilns. Dishes of this type, painted with a leaf next to a taihu rock were made during the reign of Shunzhi (1644-1661), with variations carrying on until the early Kangxi period c.1662 to 1670.  See below for a Kangxi dish we sold some years ago that came from Marchant & Son, which is dated 1667. A number of these later smaller dishes are known, another dated 1667 is in the Butler Collection (see references). The present example is closer to, but not the same as the two from the Butler Collection, dated to Shuzhi (see references). A considerable numbers of these dishes are in the Palace Museum in Beijing, suggesting they were made for the domestic market, an early example is in the Palace Museum examples, dated to 1648. Indeed, they do not seem to appear in early European collections. The leaves vary from dish to dish, clearly representing different tree species. A second example, in the Butler Collection (III.3.35), specifically mentions a Wutong leaf  (firmiana simplex) in the poem. The inscribed poems on these dishes were done by using a wax resist technique. The cobalt pigment would not adhere to the wax characters, it would be burnt off during the firing after glazing leave the white characters we see today. Dishes of this type with designs with poems and symbolism must have appealed to the Scholar class in China. As with other Shuzhi porcelain of this type the glaze has a distinct blue green tinge. See Below For More Photographs and Information.