An “ordinary” Chinese vase put up for auction in France and valued at €2,000 ($1,900) was sold for almost €9.12m ($9 million) after fiercely competitive bidding by buyers who were convinced it was a rare 18th-century artefact.

According to a report in The Guardian, auctioneers at the sale in Fontainebleau near Paris were astonished as the offers from about 30 mainly Chinese bidders kept pouring in. At the end the vase fetched  €7.7m – almost 4,000 times its estimated value. With the seller’s fees, the final purchase price worked out to €9.12m.

The tianqiuping-style porcelain vase measuring 21 x 16 inches was put in the auction by a woman living in a French overseas territory who arranged for it to be taken from her mother’s home in Brittany to Paris for the auction.

The Guardian cited Jean-Pierre Osenat, president of the auction house, as saying it was a “crazy story”. “The seller lives far away and didn’t even see the vase. She inherited it from her mother who in turn inherited it from her mother who was a big Paris collector in the last century,” Osenat said.

Tianqiuping means “heavenly sphere” and denotes the shape of the vase, which was blue and white porcelain covered in enamel and decorated with dragons and clouds. The auction house said it dated from the 20th century and described it as “quite ordinary”. Had it been 200 years older it would have been extremely rare, their expert said.

Osenat said he believes the vase will be displayed in a museum but that he cannot be sure at this stage.