Vase cover of porcelain, oviform with painted birds and flowers in red, blue and gold: Japan

Vase cover of agate, for a carved agate vase with ring handles: China

Vase cover of mottled blue and brown chalcedony, carved in high relief with a feng-huang or phoenix and a flowering lotus plant: China, 19th century AD

Vase cover of smoky quartz, surmounted by the figure of a bird holding a spray in its bill: China, 19th century AD

Vase of dark green jade with four loop handles with rings, carvings of taotie masks and archaic scrolls, and incised and gilt Shou characters, with a cover also of dark green jade with incised and gilt Shou characters, surmounted by a feng-huang (phoenix), reportedly from Yuanmingyuan (Summer Palace), Beijing: China, Qing Dynasty, 19th century

Brass cover for an oviform vase of glazed earthenware decorated with figures, landscapes and rayed discs in blue on a white ground: Middle East, Iran, 17th century

Lidded vessel of pierced brass, decorated all over with roundels and lobed medaillons with figures and animals against a background of foliage, set with small turquoises: Middle East, Iran, Isfahan, c1850-1870

Cover for a tin-glazed earthenware vase decorated with flowers and birds in yellow on a dark olive green ground: Dutch, Delft, Het Jonge Moriaenshooft Factory of Lieven van Dalen, early 18th century

Circular wooden vase cover with a carved ivory knob engraved with the head of a bird: French, Meudon, by Eugenie O'Kin Simmen, 1920s

Cover for an oval porcelain vase decorated with the witch Circe poisoning Sylla's bathing water from an edition of Ovid's Metamorphoses published in 1768/69: English, Chelsea - Derby, c. 1771 - 1773

Cover for a large porcelain vase ornamented with gold and with landscape paintings by Lessore entitled 'Winter' and 'Spring': English, Stoke-on-Trent, by Minton, 1860s.

Cover for a vase of engine-turned black basalt ware with applied decoration in low relief: English, Staffordshire, Etruria, by Josiah Wedgwood, c. 1825

Cover for a vase of lilac jasper ware with bands of white acanthus and laurel leaves: English, Staffordshire, Etruria, by Wedgwood, late 18th century

Cover for a vase of lilac jasper ware with bands of white acanthus and laurel leaves: English, Staffordshire, Etruria, by Wedgwood, late 18th century

Cover decorated with cherub and cornucopiae for a two-handled oval earthenware vase: English, Staffordshire, Stoke-on-Trent, by W.T. Copeland, 1867 - 1869

Orange cover for a vase of translucent black, opaque white and flashed orange glass decorated in black and white: Austrian, Baden, made at J. & L. Lobmeyer (factory studio) by Charlie Meaker, 1980