TWO JADE CURVED PENDANTS

LATE SHANG/WESTERN ZHOU DYNASTY, 11TH-8TH CENTURY BC

细节

TWO JADE CURVED PENDANTS
LATE SHANG/WESTERN ZHOU DYNASTY, 11TH-8TH CENTURY BC
One a flat white jade huang, each side carved with two simplified bodies detailed with scrolls tapering towards the center from a vaguely human-like head carved at each end below the notched edge, the heads facing inwards and pierced with a tiny biconical hole, the softly polished, semi-opaque stone with some cloudy inclusions; the other a curved dagger pendant with median ridge and beveled edges extending to the tip from a band of two lozenges flanked by narrow horizontal ribs, the tang carved as the head of a bird shown in profile, with hooked beak and bifurcated crest, with a small biconical perforation, the partially translucent stone of mottled caramel and milky caramel color
3¾ and 4 in. (9.5 and 10.2 cm.) long (2)

来源

Both: The Frederick M. Mayer Collection of Chinese Art; Christie's, London, 24-25 June 1974, lots 183 (dagger pendant) and 184 (huang).
Acquired in October 1974.

出版

Dagger pendant: A. Salmony, Chinese Jade Through the Wei Dynasty, New York, 1963, pl. V (1).
Dagger pendant: Na Zhiliang, ed., Yuqi Cidian (Dictionary of Chinese Jade), Wenwen Chubanshe, 1982, p. 213, no. 1915.

拍品专文

The style of carving on the white jade huang is similar to that on a light green jade huang in the Winthrop Collection illustrated by M. Loehr, Ancient Chinese Jades, Fogg Art Museum, 1975, no. 325. As with the present example the ends are carefully notched above a small perforation. The Winthrop huang is carved with two birds rather than the abstract human-like figures of this huang.

The bird-head form of the tang of the dagger pendant is most likely based on the inlaid bronze bird-head hilts of Shang dynasty bronze and jade ge daggers, such as the three in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts illustrated in Chinese Jades: Archaic and Modern, Vermont and Japan, 1977, nos. 16-18. As with the present example, the bird's head is in profile and has a hooked beak and bifurcated crest. For another similar but shorter pendant, of a similar light yellowish-brown color, see the example from the collection of Dr. Paul Singer, illustrated in the catalogue of the O.C.S. exhibition, Chinese Jade throughout the Ages, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1 May-22 June 1975, no. 19.