This intricate workmanship is very similar to a circular box also decorated with melons on vines and insects in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Zhongguo Meishu Quanji, vol. 11, no. 117, where the author cites that the carving was typical of the imperial workshops located within the Forbidden Palace, ibid, p. 38. Evidently, a number of these highly elaborate ivory boxes were also carved in Canton (present day Guangzhou) where they were produced on commission from the imperial court. Compare to two stained ivory examples included in the exhibition, Tributes from Guangdong to the Qing Court, 1987, and illustrated in the Catalogue: the first, an octagonal box decorated with flower-scrolls, no. 64; and the other an eight-lobed box with the Eight Buddhist Emblems, bajixiang, no. 65.