A pair of Chinese porcelain eagles perched astride a hollow rockwork base, with curving, orangered beak, and eyes with protruding black pupils. The breast down is white, shading into small, greyish feathers on the head, shoulders and back, the wings full-feathered and the spreading tail with five coloured feathers. In the back is a quatrefoil aperture, its cover now missing. The talons are in orange-red and gilt, and the rockwork is spattered with light turquoise, blue and crimson.

Following the popularity of the blanc de Chine figures imported into Europe by the end of the seventeenth century, a great variety of figures were produced to attract this market, many of them based on Western models.

Text adapted from Chinese and Japanese Works of Art in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen: Volume I.