1740-1780, POSSIBLY IMPERIAL PALACE WORKSHOPS

For a bottle of similar shape and colour, but lightly carved with a strapwork design and bearing a Qianlong four-character mark, see Robert W. L. Kleiner, Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Collection of Mary and George Bloch, London, 1987, p. 27, fig. 24. As in that example, this bottle has a smooth surface polish and a warm yellowish tone, often referred to as the colour of steamed chestnuts, caused by iron impurities.

Though unmarked, this bottle must surely be a product of the Beijing Palace Workshops. For a bottle in white jade of identical shape bearing a four-character Qianlong mark, see Snuff Bottles in the Collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei, 1991, Catalogue, p. 151, no. 126. See, also, an undecorated example sold at Christie's, New York, The Reif Collection of Chinese Snuff Bottles, 18 October 1993, lot 69.

For another plain bottle of similar shape but with taller neck, see Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang, A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles, The Mary and George Bloch Collection, Hong Kong, 1995, vol. I, Jade, pp. 190-191, no. 76. For a smaller jade bottle with a band of formalized archaistic 'S'-shaped elements around the body, attributed to the Palace Workshops, Beijing, see Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang, The Art of the Chinese Snuff Bottle, The J & J Collection, Hong Kong, 1993, vol. I, pp. 91-92, no. 36