Plate on footring, flat rim. Famille verte, decorated in various shades of green, yellow, blue, aubergine, iron-red and black enamel on the glaze. In the centre a horseman with his servant; a table with a flower vase, incense-burner and a brush pot; books, a weiqi-board, a lute wrapped in a cloth, scrolls with ribbons fluttering in the breeze and a building surrounded by a fence. On the sides a pattern of small lotus scrolls. On the rim four lobed panels with flowers and scrolls, alternating with four groups of the above-mentioned ‘precious objects’, such as book scrolls, incense-burners, a sceptre, a wrapped lute, and a vase. On the reverse three flower sprays in red and green. The base marked with an incense-burner in a double circle. The various elements of the representation do not form a composite whole. Apparently, the painter did not want to create one specific scene, choosing instead to depict the various objects that characterise the life a scholar (the horseman), such as the carefully maintained house with a garden, the table with writing implements and various other objects. The significance of these objects would have been immediately understood by contemporary Chin...