186. A VERY RARE LOWESTOFT TWO-HANDLED CUP, CIRCA 1770.

of porringer form, painted in colours with a lady receiving advances from her lover, a man looking on from the bushes behind, the reverse with a lady drawing water from a well, a spray of fruit below each scene and a brown line around the foot, the handles painted in puce with a husk design, 13.5cm wide across handles, 9cm diameter, 8.1cm high together with a factory waister showing a similar body shape (2)

J. Howell collection- not numbered

Provenance- Bonhams, Fine British Pottery and Porcelain, 21st May 2014, lot 84, £1,750

Note- This is a very rare form at Lowestoft. An early blue and white example from the Hunting Collection is now in the Norwich Castle Museum and is illustrated by Sheenah Smith, Lowestoft Porcelain in Norwich Castle Museum, Vol.1 (1975), pl.40, and by Christopher Spencer, Early Lowestoft (1981), fig.128. Another with enamelled floral decoration in the style of the 'Tulip painter', also at Norwich Castle, is illustrated by Geoffrey Godden, Lowestoft Porcelains (1985), pl.153 and by John Howell, Some Notes on the Introduction of Polychrome Decoration at Lowestoft, ECC Trans, Vol.9, Pt.3, pl.164(d). It is discussed at p.264 and described as the only recorded polychrome example. European figure decoration such as this is rare on Lowestoft, the present lot bearing some similarities with a bowl and a tea bowl and saucer painted in pink monochrome, the bowl illustrated by Howell, op cit, pl.157(c) and the tea bowl and saucer by Godden, op cit, pl.155.