elegantly modelled after an early Ming dynasty prototype, superbly potted with rounded shoulders rising at a gently flaring angle from the base and sweeping to a short waisted neck with a slightly everted mouth, the exterior deftly painted with a wide frieze of five sprays arranged in an alternating double register, the upper register showing detached peach, pomegranate and finger citrus, the lower register with lychee and loquat, the leafy branches further issuing small blossoms and buds, the shoulders draped by a band of pendent lotus lappets enclosing elaborately picked out trefoils, below the waisted neck collared by interlocking ruyi heads with stylised leafy florets, the foot further bordered by a band of upright overlapping plantain leaves, all painted in soft washes of copper red of a rosy-pink tone with occasional speckles of apple green, accented by simulated 'heaping and piling' effect, the recessed base centred with an underglaze-blue six-character seal mark