Dear John,

you said “What are these differences you are seeing?”

I am not seeing differences at all, please read what I said: “…..my notes are not only for John’s items, but referred to all those seen here in general.”

I believe that, despite my bad English, it is clear: to me all the items seen are from the same source, and my notes are related to all them.

As for the gilding, again I think that you have not read it. I said that there are gilt losses associated to no wear, and that is strange. Do you think that it is normal? To me it is not. All gilded pieces do show wear on the gilding, because it is one of the weakest enamels. Here instead, it is perfectly bright, no wear, and associated with losses. Not normal. It can only be explained with bad adherence.

And as for Christies etc etc being wrong, consider that Poly is referring to Christie’s, and Christie’s is referring to Howard. If Howard is wrong, then all the chain is in mistake. Is it impossible in your opinion? If I could tell how many times the big Auction houses have been undoubtedly wrong, it will fill many pages.  

If tomorrow, at the inspection of some other expert, your and the other items will result belonging from an European factory, I will not be surprised at all. You must consider that they are rare (they are the first ones that I have seen in many years), hence they are not being inspected often, by other experts or scholars. It seems that it is all connected to the first opinion, but nobody is infallible.

Giovanni

Further, if you have understood that I am not referring only to your items but also to the ones sold previously by the auction houses, please compare the “Canton” border of these pieces to any really Chinese Canton border. You will see that they are all clearly part of a single family, except those on these items.

Giovanni

@clayandbrush  I see your point that even the big players can be wrong, but what about the clear identification with the year of 1820? This service appears to have been researched and clearly associated with that date, so it is a known quantity having been ordered and come from China by this specific family. Surely the documentation exists to support this otherwise Christies, etc would not reference it. It seems already proven, does it not? It would be good to see the information in the Howard book. I wish one of us had it to see what it says. But with armorial sets, I don't think we would see an entire set historically incorrectly assessed like you are suggesting as maybe possible, especially when it is clearly documented to exist. More to be discovered I'm sure, but I remain confident.

Well, my English must be very bad. Or you are not understanding.

Did I say that they are not correctly dated? Again, please read and stay on what it is written, do not add what has not been said. If, and I am stressing the "IF", they have been ordered to an European factory, why they should not have been ordered in 1820?

You are right, BTW, that we are discussing without knowing the sources on which Howard was relying.

Giovanni

Apparently, I have lost something here, the first item posted does not look like the orange Fitzhugh pattern, to me it looks like a rose famille palette, so I do not understand why it is compared to an orange set of Fitzhugh.  I object, irrelevant and immaterial evidence, I'll throw in a chain of custody objection as well.  What the heck, it also does not look like blue or green Fitzhugh either, not all Chinese export is classified as Fitzhugh pattern, if it is, then I need to be held back and begin my education in ceramics again.

Further, would an old family Seton have had several different china sets in the old china cupboards not all purchased at the same time?

I am not really commenting any further, rather I wanted to add that I found it interesting that the early dinner services used a different armorial/motto.  Also, that by the early 1800s there were family members in France.

@johnshoe  What is the source of your bowl?  If Angus Seton is selling an old inherited piece and as reputable auction houses like to say, "thus by family descent," then no problem, but if it suddenly appeared out of nowhere, then it may prove difficult to tie them in date to the other pieces given as evidence.  I love a Cinderella story and I hope you will be successful. The world is sometimes better served by tilting at windmills.  I hope you secured at a good price and I look forward to the result of the evaluation.

@sharonp  The Fitzhugh set was just an interesting aspect as it appears to be an additional set ordered by the same family and so I was researching and looking for other examples with the same coat of arms, so I just shared for the history of it that is all. In reading the reference material it was stated that the family ordered a total of 5 armorial sets. I have not yet seen examples from the other three sets. I am not aware of the details of why they apparently ordered so many or when but it would be interesting to know. I also uncovered in my research something I found interesting which is that the year associated with this service is stated as the year which these sets were stopped from coming to Europe due to European makers trying to prevent competition from the Chinese exporters. That might make this one of the last armorial sets to come over prior to the stoppage, which is rather interesting i thought. I am not clear of whether they were continued at a later time. Perhaps one of you knows?

As to your question about provenance they come from an old American family I am close with that had many good Chinese items, including Yongzheng, Qianlong, and Kangxi examples, and other periods as well. In fact, they randomly have an old Yongzheng armorial charger which they approached a major auction house with who has validated it's authenticity, not because of the family,who has no historical association with that particular coat of arms, but because of the quality of the piece itself, which was clear to them based on pictures. In fact the family knew nothing about the charger when pictures were sent to the Auction house - they really weren't even certain it was Chinese. So, while a lot of importance is certainly placed on provenance, I have seen it is also true that sometimes it doesn't need to exist for a piece to be validated. Of course, we see this every week because virtually none of the items that Peter discusses on ebay or catawicki have much if any provenance, yet it is usually clear what they are or aren't based on objective assessment of the quality. All things being equal, of course we would always prefer to have great provenance, which I don't deny can bump up value in some cases as peter and other mention frequently. 

@julia  I would love to see those other three sets if you found links that you could share that would be wonderful because I have not found them.

@clayandbrush  What I meant is that I thought you had clearly suggested the possibility they could have been made in Europe. So, my point is that it has already been established by experts that they were made in China, so somewhere there is apparently actual documentation, although you and I have not seen it with our own eyes, of the manufacture and ordering of this set that was made in China and shipped to Europe. In fact there is apparently documentation the family ordered five different armorial sets over time.This is why I don't understand why you are considering that they could somehow have been made in Europe when they are documented to have been made in China? But aside from all this debate, I would love to know just from an artistic perspective what you think of the pieces from this dinner set? I am biased, but to me they are rather beautiful in design. I love the blending of colors with the butterflies and flowers and the lovely scenes, for which I'd love to know the story for if there is one. Cheers!

John, when I said the "earlier dinner services" I didn't necessarily mean 3.  I meant earlier in time.  I would also cast some doubt over there having been 5 sets as other references state 4.

This is where I found the info.  I am making no claims for any of this. just passing it on.  I think the info is taken from the photo of the printed page.  You'll see what I mean.

Julia

https://www.1stdibs.co.uk/furniture/dining-entertaining/bowls/chinese-export-armorial-punch-bowl-from-set-daniel-seton-surat-1795/id-f_16296381/

Dear John,

By now, we do not know on which basis these items are dated. I am meaning yours and the other ones from the same set, as I do not believe so much about the replacement supposition.

May be there are historical records, may be not, we do not know. So IMO you should not take that from granted.

Saying that, let’s talk about the items, as it always has been. What do I mean by saying “as it always has been”? I see that you are surprised by the fact that an auction house accepted some dishes despite not having provenance. That is not strange, that has always been the normal, and it should actually be!! Is it easier to fake an item or to fake the provenance in your opinion?

In my experience, coming from years back, I saw that provenance started to become more and more important as the old experts of the Auction houses were gone. The new ones are, in many cases, seriously lacking competence, hence the magic key: provenance!

If I am submitting an item for sale to an auction house it is because I already know what it is. If asked in advance about its provenance, I know that I am talking to a not expert one. And believe me, it has been always proven.

Back to your questions, is it proven that these items are Chinese? I do not know, may be yes, may be not, it is stated on a book written about 50 years ago. We must see on which basis they are dated.

You said that you would love to know from an artistic point what I think about that, and that you find them beautiful, etc.

I never said that they are not beautiful. What I think from the artistic point I think that I have clearly explained. Can you please spend a bit of time in comparing the border decoration with any Canton border? May be you will understand my points.

To my view, if Chinese, they are something completely apart from what I have seen up to now.

Not impossible, highly unusual, highly not probable, read it as you wish, I can’t have a definitive answer.

Regards

Giovanni

PS: BTW Canton armorial ware clearly made after 1820 do exist. And with the typical Canton border.

@julia   I'm not sure if that is the same Seton family as we have been discussing. Below is some history I found about the line.

Seton of Abercorn in the Baronetage of Nova Scotia (1663)

Seton of Abercorn

• Sir Walter Seton, 1st Baronet (died 1692)
• Sir Walter Seton, 2nd Baronet (died 1708)
• Sir Henry Seton, 3rd Baronet (died 1751)
• Sir Henry Seton, 4th Baronet (died 1788)
• Sir Alexander Seton, 5th Baronet (1772–1810)
• Sir Henry John Seton, 6th Baronet (1796–1868)
• Sir Charles Hay Seton, 7th Baronet (1797–1869)
• Sir Bruce Maxwell Seton, 8th Baronet (1836–1915)
• Sir Bruce Gordon Seton, 9th Baronet (1868–1932)
• Sir Alexander Hay Seton, 10th Baronet (1904–1963)
• Sir Bruce Lovat Seton, 11th Baronet (1909–1969)
• Sir Christopher Bruce Seton, 12th Baronet (1909–1988)
• Sir Iain Bruce Seton, 13th Baronet (born 1942)

@clayandbrush  I am going to find a copy of that Howard book or find someone who has it and see what it says. As to your point about the decoration being unique and different from other Chinese items of the time, it might just be because it was custom made and it is indeed a unique set, so perhaps that is all that is necessary to explain it. To me that isn't as hard to believe as it seems to be for you, probably because I have not seen as many pieces as you have from that time that are a certain way, so I do not have that knowledge. I do not doubt your observation that it is unique. Hopefully that will turn out to be a good thing and not end up being discovered that it was made in France or some such thing. But I would ask you to show specific examples of items you think it should look like because I have looked and I do see many flower and butterfly examples that to me are different in some ways but similar in others, so it doesn't seem like such a stretch to me that these are Chinese from that time. I don't see why that are so vastly different and unlikely Chinese in your mind. Can you offer pictures to show this difference, because I would like to see specifically what you are referring to.