The subject of the three goats in a field on a sunny spring day was a popular theme referring to the yang principle in yinyang cosmology. The Chinese word for sun is taiyang, and that for goat is yang, a pun on the yang of yinyang. As such, the three goats, sanyang, made an allusion to the auspicious phrase sanyang kaitai, 'the beginnings of good fortune', which refers to the rebirth of nature in spring and the coming of renewed prosperity, as well as to the three Daoist gods known as the Sanyangsheng.

For a discussion of the Official School of hard-stone carving, see Moss et. al., A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles, Volume 2, Quartz, no. 258, where the numerous subsequent examples are all of the school.