This is a Chinese blue and white porcelain bowl found in the famous Tea Sing shipwreck.

The Tek Sing “True Star” was a large three-masted Chinese ocean-going junk which sank on February 6, 1822 in an area of the South China Sea known as the Belvidere Shoals. The vessel was 50 meters in length, 10 meters wide, and weighed about a thousand tons. Its tallest mast was estimated to be 90 feet in height. The ship was manned by a crew of 200 and had approx. 1600 passengers. The great loss of life associated with the sinking has led to the Tek Sing being referred to in modern times as the “Titanic of the East”.

On May 12, 1999, British marine salvor Michael Hatcher discovered the wreck of the Tek Sing in an area of the South China Sea north of Java, east of Sumatra and south of Singapore. His crew raised about 350,000 pieces of the ship’s cargo in what is described as the largest sunken cache of Chinese porcelain ever recovered.

The Tek Sing’s recovered cargo was auctioned at Nagel Auctions in Stuttgart, Germany in November 2000.

Size: 162 x 70 mm

Provenance: Ex. private collection, UK. Purchased at UK auction. *Originally auctioned in Stuttgart, Germany in November 2000. Nagel Auctions label and certificate supplied.