THREE SMALL PALE GREENISH-WHITE JADE PENDANTS

SHANG/EARLY WESTERN ZHOU DYNASTY, CIRCA 1200-1000 BC

Details

THREE SMALL PALE GREENISH-WHITE JADE PENDANTS
SHANG/EARLY WESTERN ZHOU DYNASTY, CIRCA 1200-1000 BC
Including a cicada carved with grooves on both slightly convex sides to delineate the head, circular eyes, bent forelegs and long back legs that flank the tapering wings, pierced through the tiny pointed mouth; a miniature tortoise with tiny legs projecting from the edge of the scroll-carved carapace, the extended neck with bullnose perforation behind the sideways-turned head, the reverse plain; and a tapering chrysalis pendant, carved in the round with rounded ribs spiralling from a pierced tab at the top to the tip
2 3/16, 1 1/8 and 2 3/8 in. (5.5, 2.9 and 6 cm.) long, one box (3)

Provenance

All: A.W. Bahr Collection, Weybridge, 1963.

Literature

Tortoise: Stanley Charles Nott, Chinese Jade throughout the Ages, New York, 1937, pl. XX (right).
A. Salmony, Carved Jade of Ancient China, Berkeley, 1938, XXVI (5).

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Lot Essay

The rare miniature jade figure of a tortoise is very similar to one in the Winthrop Collection illustrated by M. Loehr, Ancient Chinese Jades, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, 1975, p. 211, no. 309. pl. X (5). See, also, the similar example in the Sonnenschein Collection illustrated by A. Salmony, Archaic Chinese Jades, The Art Institute of Chicago, 1952, pl. CV (9).

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