Asian language ID mark on vase

I've got a vase/urn set acquired by my mother in the mid-70's at latest. I've already found a doppelganger set with an foil "Nanco Boston Mass" sticker on it on ebay, and i'm relatively sure it aint worth much.

On my set, 3 of pieces have the small foil 'made in taiwan' sticker of death, but 1 of them has a weird ID mark on it. I'm guessing its mandarin, because taiwan, but i've seen this style of mark before that looks very rounded and is usually in gold.

What are these marks, and what are they trying to tell me about the object? are they only found in 1 language? Do they all say "this was made in X asian country really cheap for export to gullible americans" in various languages? Just curious, because these style of marks keep popping up every now and then, and i can never tell what they mean.

 

I think it's upside down.....& yup...weird mark !!

 

I suspect she bought them all as a set in the 1970's and were new when she bought them. "Gullible" is a little harsh though. They were decorator items that were quite popular at the time. They came over by the boatload, were inexpensive, and are not very tough to find; hence the low value. I wouldn't spend a lot of time on identifying the marks - they won't end up making much difference.
Don

 

Agree with Don.
The Taiwan imports followed Japan as major source of souvenirs and low cost decorator items. 1970s -early 80s would be the right time frame.

I think the piece you are asking about was bought later, maybe even 1990s. Could be from China.

As Don said finding out what it says, won't increase the value.

These items are nice, and people like cobalt blue. However, price wise they are not very valuable. $5-$18 each for retail store value.

 

Thanks guys. My interest in the mark was really more for future reference, like if I see that style of mark on a piece in a thrift store should I immediately put it down and move on, or do a little digging on the phone to try to find out more about it.

Unfortunately I was born in the 80's so I wasn't around to see the boom of these decorator import products. But its always good to learn a bit more about the rarity level of things that I'll end up coming across frequently.

 

In general I don't buy Chinese items with that type of mark. 99% of time the item has only decorative value. To be honest I usually avoid buying Chinese items for resale. It's a complicated area and I just don't feel confident with my limited knowledge.
Don

 

Nice white and fairly clean rim on the bottom.
Gold over glaze mark.
Good indications the items are newer as in after the 1960s for Japan, after the 1980s for China.