Song Dynasty (960-1279)

Finely potted, with rounded sides incurved at the rim and raised on a short, unglazed foot. The sides are covered with a thick crackle-suffused glaze of cloudy, greenish-blue color thinning to a mushroom tone at the top rim and stopping just above the foot rim, the interior with a small dab of purple, the recessed base partially glazed. D. 2 3/4 in.

Provenance: According the Harry A. Lakin's heirs, successful Brewery owner and Philanthropist, Cecil Norman Colburne Higgins (1856-1911) and his friend and fellow Bedford collector, Harry Austin Lakin (1869-1963) purchased in partnership a collection of European and Asian porcelain in 1897. Lakin was a grandson of the famous potter Thomas Lakin (1769-1821) of the Staffordshire pottery "Lakin & Poole". Higgins liked European porcelain and Lakin preferred Chinese porcelain, the collection was divided accordingly. The pieces which Higgins retained became part of his museum in Bedford, England, The Cecil Higgins Museum, opened in 1949 at the former Higgins home. (Today known as The Higgins Bedford Museum). Upon Harry Lakin's death in 1963, Lakin's portion of the 1897 joint purchase descended to his daughter, Kathleen Edith Lakin (1912-1985) where it remained packed in trunks and stored away
Thence by descent to the present owners