Soup plate, Qianlong c.1745, with the quarterly arms of Cooke with Twysden in pretence
Finely decorated soup plate made for George Cooke (1705-68), a barrister and Chief Protonotary of the Common Pleas, as had been his father Sir George Cooke (to whom the service in CAP Volume I, has been incorrectly attributed).
Cooke married in 1735 Catherine, posthumous daughter and co-heir of Sir Thomas Twysden, 4th Baronet of Royden Hall, Peckham. In 1754 George Cooke was returned unopposed as MP for Middlesex, but in the contested election year of 1768 was succeeded by the radical journalist John Wilkes, dying just a month later. In his will he leaves "all my china at Harefield and the china at my house in London that has my arms thereon, I give to my eldest son George John Cooke".
[Harefield Park in Middlesex would later become famous as a London hospital and for its ground-breaking work in heart transplants.]
The intricate heraldry (a tribute to the Chinese craftsman) shows the arms of Cooke in the top left and bottom right quarters, quartering Warren (a blue and gold chequered ground) with a small central shield ’in pretence’ with the arms of Twysden, indicating marriage to an heiress. The arms, within an elaborate cartouche with ferns and flowers, are very finely painted; the enamels and gilding all original.
Reference : Chinese Armorial Porcelain, Volume I, p.325
Condition : Tiny reverse chip filled, otherwise in very good condition
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