2008 Record shot by C. Lafiandra. Sauceboat

Images(2)

Sauceboat

Dateca. 1760

OriginAsia, China, Jingdezhen

MediumHard-paste porcelain

DimensionsOverall: 3 x 4 1/4 x 7 5/8in. (7.6 x 10.8 x 19.4cm)

Credit LinePartial gift, Elizabeth Edmonson Cooper in memory of Dr. George Gilmer and Museum Purchase

Object number2008-122

DescriptionSauceboat. Hard-paste porcelain lobed sauceboat decorated in the famille rose palette of pink, blue, green, iron-red, and white. The main interior design is of plants growing by pierced rocks including stems of peony, prunus, and other flowers. This design is framed by an iron-red band with reserved lotus-flower panels, which follows the interior rim of the sauceboat. The exterior is decorated with several sprays of flowers spaced evenly around the body and a spearhead border at the rim.Label TextThis sauceboat was owned by the Gilmer family of Williamsburg. Peachy Ridgway Gilmer was likely its first owner. He was born in 1737 in Williamsburg and was the son of Dr. George Gilmer and Mary Peachy, daughter of Dr. Thomas Walker of King and Queen County, Virginia. Dr. Gilmer was a Scottish born physician who came to Williamsburg in 1731 and married Mary Peachy in 1732. Peachy Ridgway Gilmer married Mary Meriwether of Hanover County in 1762 in Augusta County, Virginia. They moved to Georgia and Peachy Gilmer died in 1789 in Augusta County, Georgia. The sauceboat was passed by descent through the family until it was given to Colonial Williamsburg in 2008.

This design was one of the most popular famille rose patterns depicted on eighteenth-century Chinese export porcelain.ProvenanceDescended in the family of Dr. George Gilmer who lived in Williamsburg during the eighteenth-century.

Peachy Ridgeway Gilmer and Mary Meriwether, to their son, Thomas Meriwether Gilmer and Elisabeth Lewis, to their daughter, Lucy Ann Gilmer and Benjamin Smith Bibb, to their daughter, Martha Dandridge Bibb, to their daughter Susannah Porter, to Mattie Gilmer Bibb Edmanson, to her daughter, Elizabeth Edmanson Cooper, to Colonial Williamsburg.