"Brother-in-law, this is a Chenghua blue and white entwined branch okra pattern palace cup, very rare! This kind of entwined branch flower pattern was also in the Yongle Xuande year, but the various floral patterns painted on the palace bowl fired in the Chenghua period are more lively. ”

"Palace bowl, used in the palace?"

The official kiln is official, but not all of them are provided to the royal family, but once the "palace" is added...

"Well, it's an imperial porcelain, for the imperial porcelain of the Ming Dynasty, this palace bowl is still very special, and the Chenghua Dynasty and the previous and subsequent dynasties can't see this, it's very different......"

What's different?

“...... According to the palace, there should be no pattern inside, and there are very few palace bowls with floral patterns inside and outside, which are very expensive, very expensive!"

Speaking of this, Zhang Nan suddenly thought of something, and cut off all the words he originally wanted to continue.

Because Xiang Weirong must have regarded it as a "bowl".

"Brother-in-law, the pronunciation and meaning of this palace bowl I said are the same as the bowl, but the word..."

While talking and gesturing, Xiang Weirong and Alyosha understood that "bowl" and "cup" are basically the same in meaning: the bowl is the same bowl, but it is not the same word at all!

If we had to make a literal distinction, it would be that all containers with large mouths and small stomachs can be called "cups", while "bowls" mainly refer to utensils used for eating.

As for the question of why it is called Gong Yu and not Gong Wan, Zhang Nan maliciously "studied" it in his previous life, so he smiled and said: "People are also the emperor Lao Tzu, and it is said that it is not good to eat with an old sea bowl, and it is much more elegant to call it a palace bowl full of ancient meaning."

Royal, that's the virtue.

As for now...... Hehe, the status of daily utensils in the porcelain collection is low, and in addition to the small bits and pieces such as small soup spoons and small plates, the bowls are of the lowest grade, and then they are plates.

All the ghosts who play this line of work, call a cup that no one in a hundred people knows, and look at it with a high-end atmosphere!"

Well, it's just a bowl, the bowl for the royal dinner in the Ming Dynasty, I don't know if it was used by Emperor Chenghua, or by concubines and eunuchs: it didn't write "emperor's special" on it, and it wasn't a dragon bowl that others couldn't use.

Henry was also there, and he couldn't understand the Chinese conversation between the boss and Mr. Xiang, because even if he took care of him, Zhang Nan couldn't describe this palace bowl to his brother-in-law in English, especially the difference between "cup" and "bowl".

But there are a few sentences that Zhang Nan still uses in English, such as "very expensive, very expensive!"

Just such a small bowl will be said by Zhang Nan to be very expensive, and Henry is curious: How expensive is it?

In Henry's eyes, he really couldn't see how expensive such a small bowl would be 500 years ago: in order to take care of him, Zhang Nan said what the Chenghua period was.

Putting the small bowl on the coffee table, Zhang Nan said to Alyosha: "Let Jacob go to the yacht, I put a few brochures of the auction company on the table in the living room, and there is a copy of this year's spring auction at Hong Kong Christie's, let him bring it." ”

Zhang Nan, or the agent of "Sunshine Star", is a VIP customer of several major auction houses, and every year, large and small auction brochures will be mailed very actively, and there is more than one set.

Not only pre-shoot brochures, but also post-shoot brochures and give them away.

Zhang Nan will also have a set every time, flip through it when he has time, and call the agent when he sees something interested, and try to see if he can win it at a reasonable psychological price.

If you don't find something you're interested in, then it's good to take a look: the printing quality is very good, even if you hit the time of occurrence, by the way to understand the market.

Soon, Jacob arrived with a beautifully printed brochure.

Zhang Nan turned to the third page and handed it to Henry.

"Oh! that's incredible!"

On the page of the booklet, there are three photos of the top and bottom and side of a bowl, and there is also a bilingual print in Chinese traditional Chinese and English, and the same is a Chenghua blue and white entwined branch okra pattern palace cup.

The shape is the same, the texture is almost the same, the difference is that the palace bowl in the brochure is plain white, according to Zhang Nan, it is not as rare as the one on the coffee table.

Here's the point: the starting price is 8 million Hong Kong dollars!

The Hong Kong dollar has remained between 7.75 and 7.85 to 1 against the US dollar over the years, which means that the starting price of that small bowl has exceeded $1 million!

At this moment, there was a knock on the door, it was a staff member of "Treasure Hunt", and he brought the mirror of Napoleon.

The footage of the hand mirror has been filmed, and there is no such thing as the original owner.

This would be very interesting: one may have been the emperor's rice bowl with a starting price of more than $1 million, and it is impossible to find out who fired it, and the other is a mirror given to his subordinates by the most famous emperor and military commander in modern Europe, on which the court painter painted had a name and a surname, plus the emperor's autograph, but it was only worth 800 yuan!

As for the one on the coffee table, it was even rarer, but it was picked up from an illiterate person, and it was basically used as an addition to an antique vase worth $100.

The atmosphere in the lounge was weird, and Zhang Nan also felt awkward, breaking the atmosphere and teasingly asked: "Will Monsieur Napoleon be so angry that he vomits blood?"

If Napoleon could vomit blood in anger, then in another 25 years, he would have to be so angry that he would bleed to death: Zhang Nan remembered that at that time, Xiangjiang photographed a Chenghua palace bowl that was similar to that on the coffee table, and the buyer paid 141 million Hong Kong dollars after counting the commission!

How much was Napoleon's hand mirror worth at that time?

Less than $2000!

This person must not be compared, people are more popular than dead people!

In Henry's eyes, $1 million was not a particularly large amount for the boss. But when combined with such a small porcelain bowl, it seems too amazing.

You must know that the museum is "hunting for treasures", and those who collect famous paintings do not come, even so, in the end, the most valuable thing is found to be 1 million.

And this bowl was bought at the flea market at the door, and the million is just the starting price, which makes people want to watch a sci-fi movie just thinking about it.

The antique industry is so magical!

"Boss, how many such bowls are there in the world now?"

Hearing Henry's curiosity, Zhang Nan said: "No one knows the specifics, but more than ten is certain." Perhaps more, there are dozens of them collected by museums and collectors.

Bowls are the most used in firing, and even if they are the most easily damaged, they should not be extremely rare if they are preserved for 500 years. ”

Well, it seems that there are more than Napoleon's hand mirrors in the world.

“...... Such a intact Chenghua blue and white palace cup, which was worth 30 yuan in the capital glaze factory in the thirties, is now crazy, and will be even crazier in the future!

Just make a batch of eating guys, why bother!"

30 pieces?

RMB?USD?

In response to Henry's question, Zhang Nan said again: "It's a silver dollar, and Huaxia used silver dollars at that time." There is a book called "Antiques Talk about Old News" that there is such an incident: in the early years of the Republic of China, there was an antique shop called Qizhai in the capital Liuli Factory, which was a business paid by the Qing Dynasty's alcohol palace, and there were many good things.

Chenghua's blue and white bowls are not a good thing in their store, and later the Republic of China gave preferential treatment to the Qing royal family, and the trade was done, and there was a stack of bowls in the store when Chenghua was on the shelves for twenty or thirty years, and no one touched it once.

One day in the summer of 1931, a colleague, the deputy manager of the Yawenzhai antique shop, came to Xiangqizhai and saw that the stack of Chenghua blue and white bowls had not been sold for so many years, so he asked the owner of Xiangqizhai: How much does it cost to sell you a pair of bowls?

The boss told him: You give me 60 silver dollars for a couple, I don't care if you sell more or less, and the amount you earn is yours.

Trustworthy peers don't need a deposit, pay first or anything, take it first, sell it and then settle the account.

The deputy manager took down the stack of blue and white palace cups from the shelf, and when he saw that three of the eight bowls were broken, two of them were cracked, and one had a defective mouth, and finally he chose a good pair and took them back to Yawenzhai.

In the end, the pair of flawless Chenghua blue and white palace cups were sold to a British antique dealer, and 100 silver dollars were sold.

As for the remaining ones that are a little problematic, Xiangqi Zhai later sold for about two or three hundred silver dollars, one of which went to the United States in the late 30s after two hands, and sold for more than 10,000 dollars at that time.

Today I picked up a leak, or a big leak!

There is a saying that those who are qualified to be picked up are also lucky, and it seems that they will have to take care of that black buddy's business if they have the opportunity in the future. ”

Bad conscience!

As for the "black buddies", there is serious racial discrimination in the United States, but everyone here knows that the boss said that this Chinese "black buddy" does not mean discrimination at all, it can be regarded as a kind of intimacy.

More than 10,000 US dollars more than 50 years ago, now it is not counting the appreciation change in the value of antique collections, but only how much can the currency itself be worth?

The simplest and rude calculation is based on the price of gold, 10,000 US dollars as the benchmark, the original 10,000 is now at least 120,000 US dollars, and that bowl is still flawed!

And the one at hand is flawless, then the black buddy can go to hit the wall!