[32] The three fruits (san kuo) are the peach, pomegranate, and finger citron, which typify the Three Abundances of years, sons and happiness.
[33] Wu fu. This may, however, be emblematically rendered by five bats, the bat (fu) being a common rebus for fu (happiness).
[35] According to Bushell, O. C. A., p. 130, “cobalt blue, as we learn from the official annals of the Sung dynasty (Sung shih, bk. 490, fol. 12), was brought to China by the Arabs under the name of wu ming yi.” This takes it back to the tenth century. Wu ming yi (nameless rarity) was afterwards used as a general name for cobalt blue, and was applied to the native mineral. The name was sometimes varied to wu ming tzŭ. Though we are not expressly told the source of the su-ni-p’o blue, it is easily guessed. For the Ming Annals (bk. 325) state that among the objects brought as tribute by envoys from Sumatra were “precious stones, agate, crystal, carbonate of copper, rhinoceros horn, and
hui hui ch’ing (Mohammedan blue).” See W. P. Groeneveldt, Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen, vol. xxxix., p. 92. These envoys arrived in 1426, 1430, 1433, 1434, and for the last time in 1486. Sumatra was a meeting-place of the traders from East and West, and no doubt the Mohammedan blue was brought thither by Arab merchants. Possibly some of the mineral was brought back by the celebrated eunuch Chêng Ho, who led an expedition to Sumatra in the Yung Lo period. See also p. [30].
[36] See Cat. B. F. A., 1910, L 23; a pilgrim bottle belonging to Mrs. Halsey, inscribed after export to India with the word Alamgir, a name of the famous Aurungzib. Cf. also the fine cylindrical vase in the Victoria and Albert Museum (Case 2), with floral scrolls in this type of blue combined with underglaze red, and the Hsüan Tê mark.
[37] Op. cit., Nos. 9, 31, 37, 39, 48, 69 and 83.
[38] Hui hu is a variant for hui hui (Mohammedan).
[39] Probably due to over-firing.