This small, olive-green jade represents a miniature version of the ge-dagger blade popular throughout the Shang era. One of the typical variations of this dagger blade is the symmetrical, rectangular blade with sharp point at one end, long central median running the length of the blade, surrounded by a beveled blade edge and pierced at the haft by a hole once used for lashing the handle. A comparably small jade ge from the Fu Hao tomb at Anyang, Yinxu Fu Hao mu, n.d., Beijing, p. 138, fig. 73:5, pl. 111:3, is described by the excavators as a "nongqi" or "plaything". The slightly smaller size of the present example dictates a similar function