In 1710 Meissen, near Dresden in eastern Germany, became the first European factory to make ‘true’ porcelain of the type made in East Asia, sometimes known in the West as ‘hard-paste’ porcelain. The discovery was made by an alchemist, Johann Friedrich Böttger (1682-1719), who had been imprisoned by Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland (1670-1733), and who achieved this working in collaboration with scientists and geologists at the Saxon court in Dresden. The earliest Meissen porcelains were made with kaolin in combination with alabaster, which replaced the china stone (petuntse) used at Jingdezhen; they are a distinctive cream colour and are often known as ‘Böttger porcelain’.

Until about 1720 comparatively little ‘Böttger porcelain’ had painted decoration: the factory struggled to master the enamelling technology, and painting in underglaze blue was not achieved until 1717, when a small bowl painted in blue was presented to Augustus the Strong. Instead, most ‘Böttger porcelain’ featured the combination of sparingly applied relief decoration set against large areas of undecorated porcelain, as here. Some time before 1730 the factory changed its formula (eliminating the alabaster), making it whiter and closer to the material made at Jingdezhen.

This vessel is based on the shape of a Japanese sake bottle, which was reproduced in both Böttger’s porcelain and his red stoneware or 'Jasper porcelain'; the latter was inspired by Chinese Yixing pottery and had been in production at Meissen since 1710. It would have been intended solely for display. The applied figure decoration is copied from reliefs by the sixteenth-century German medallist Peter Flötner.