A RARE CALCIFIED SERPENTINE KNIFE

Details

A RARE CALCIFIED SERPENTINE KNIFE
WARRING STATES PERIOD

Carved as a long slender blade of slightly curved outline tapering in thickness towards the tip and the cutting edge from an upper, and thicker, flat edge which is a continuation of the narrow, beveled handle, fitted at its end with a short similar section set at the base of a slight saddle with raised edges from which issues a faceted oval ring, the blade now altered from burial to an opaque pale and dark mottled gray with a few translucent buff patches remaining, the ring section somewhat opaque and of buff color
7 5/8in. (19.3cm.) long, box

Lot Essay

The shape of this knife appears to be based on contemporary bronze knives which were used for peeling bamboo strips. Compare the bronze example excavated in 1965, along with other bronze tools used for preparing bamboo strips, from a Chu State tomb, 4th-3rd century B.C., at Wangshan, Jianling county, Hubei province, included in the exhibition, Mysteries of Ancient China, British Museum, 1996, and illustrated by Jessica Rawson in the Catalogue, p. 150-151, no. 69. Compare, also, the gilt-bronze knife included in the exhibition, Chinese Archaic Jades and Bronzes From the estate of Professor Max Loehr and others, J.J. Lally & Co., June 4-30, l993, Catalogue, no. 112, where the antecedents of these ring-pommeled knives is discussed

A set of small jade knives of this type included in the Collector's Exhibition of Archaic Chinese Jades, National Palace Museum, Taipei, 1995, Catalogue, no. 67, do not have the same curved outline as the present example or the bronze prototypes