Bowdoin College Museum of Art

Preview image of work. porcelain, Saucer 19955

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Saucer

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Artist

Artist Unidentified

Title

Saucer

Dimensions

1 1/8 in. x 5 11/16 in. (2.86 cm x 14.45 cm)

Object Type

ceramic

Creation Place

Asia, China

Medium and Support

porcelain

Credit Line

Courtesy the George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections and Archives, Bowdoin College Library

Copyright

This artwork may be under copyright. For further information, please consult the Museum’s Copyright Terms and Conditions.

Beginning in the seventeenth century, Dutch and English trading companies imported luxury goods and spices from the Orient, launching a craze for coffee, tea and the porcelains in which to drink them. Aristocratic European families began the trend of having heraldic coats-of-arms copied onto porcelains in Canton, China. Even after establishing a new democracy, Americans enjoyed heraldry, turning to pattern books to create their own designs. Bearing the arms of the Vaughans and Apthorps of Hallowell, Maine, these are rare American examples. Born in England, Charles Vaughan (1759–1839) moved to the Kennebec River to promote land interests of the Kennebec Proprietors, a company of which the Bowdoins were also members. Vaughan joined Bowdoin’s Overseers in 1811. These porcelains are among the extensive Vaughan holdings in Bowdoin’s Special Collections.