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This blue and white jar painted with outline and wash cobalt blue designs and symbols is an example of export porcelain and the influence of Jesuit missionaries in China. The bulbous body with a tall rimmed mouth, curved waist and everted foot is decorated with traditional Chinese motifs of lotuses, reeds, and flying insects. One side is marked prominently with the mark of the Jesuit Order; the monogram "IHS' for "Iesous Hominum Salvator" ("Jesus, savior of man"), accented with a cross and placed above three converging nails, appears in a quatrefoil frame. In the middle Ming period in the early 16th century, the Portuguese became a principle maritime power in the Far East and soon developed a flourishing trade in Chinese blue and white porcelain for the European market and for countries in Southeast Asia. Jesuit missionaries also traveled throughout China, often commissioning their own porcelain.