Tin-glazed earthenware was made in England from the sixteenth century and in the following century was decorated in the style of imported pottery from Delft, with the result that it became known as 'delftware'. This piece is one of the largest English delftware punchbowls and bears a finely painted elevation of a ship. Such 'ship bowls' were a speciality of the Liverpool ceramic factories - one of which advertised 'the likeness of vessels taken and painted in the most correct and masterly manner' - and were also made at Bristol. Together with London, these two cities were the main centres for English delftware, being well placed to import clay from Ireland and to export wares to the American colonies. Enamelling, used here for the orange and red, is common on European tin-glazed earthenware but rare on English Delftware and was a further speciality of the Liverpool factories.

Punch came to Europe during the seventeenth century as a result of the East India trade, which also brought Chinese ceramics to the West, and originally contained arrack, a rum-like spirit from Goa and Jakarta, together with lemon juice, water, sugar and spices. Ceramic punchbowls were made in Europe from the 1680s to the 1820s, especially in Britain, and also in China for export to Europe and America. The smallest were for individual use, and many larger ones were made for public houses and communal drinking. The largest bowls, such as this one, often bore commemorative inscriptions or designs and may have been primarily intended as decorative presentation pieces rather than for actual use.