Character Marks on Blue & White Bowl

[tipton444]

Hello All,

I was lucky enough to pick up 3 of these bowls at a local church tag sale.  I always get in first because I grew up going there, and you'd be surprised at some of the pieces I have found...giant pieces of silver from the 1700's, paintings, and now these bowls.  Can someone be so kind and tell me what the mark on the bottom means?  It appears to be a Qing Dynasty stamp, but I couldn't find it and I'm far from an expert.  I recognize the bottom left quadrant but that's it.  The bowls are in remarkable condition, so I'm hoping they are indeed old.  What age range does the character marks give?  Thank you all very much.

[Stan]

The mark say's Made at Jingdezhen, and it looks like it could be printed, a close up of the detail could confirm this.

[tipton444]

Ah okay I see, I guess I was mistaken.  Thank you very much for your response.  Sometimes I see Chinese porcelain pieces that are hundreds of years old and they look absolutely perfect, so now I even question the stuff that looks to good to be true.  So all the stamp says is made in Jingdezhen?  It doesn't give a time period or anything like that?  What would you estimate?  This is the only closeup picture I currently have at the moment, I don't know if it is good enough for you to tell if it is printed.  It looks under the glaze to me, but that doesn't mean a whole lot does it? 

[tipton444]

I did a quick search and found a pair of vases with the same Jingdezhen character mark on the bottom, and the description said they were old but didn't really give an age.  Obviously, the vases are much nicer, but it would be neat to find out more.  (I apologize if I'm not allowed to copy paste a sold ebay listing!)

tinyurl.com/ydx5mgzy

[peterp]

The term "old" is relative to the person. It does not mean antique. People with vintage items may consider them old, but someone collecting items from hundreds of years earlier, considers these not old. The legal requirement for an item to be "antique" in many jurisdictions is "over 100 years" old.
That said, you can consider any item with a Jingdezhen mark, like yours, to be made in the People's Republic of China era, or relatively recent.

[tipton444]

Thank you very much for the help!  Happy to have learned something here. 

[Stan]

I would like to say I have purchased items from Joanies before, and she by far has the nicest things, but I have seen things that she said was late Qing that had 20th century decorations but for the most part she has top quality items and it reflects in the sold price, I would also say that real Chinese Antique Porcelain is getting harder and harder to find and I think this also is reflecting in her Chinese porcelain, buyer beware.