This style of rhyton with a dragon mouth at the base belongs to a distinct group of jade carvings. The dragon, the smaller clambering qilong and the archaistic motifs around the cup are common features of these jades. Compare the example from the Gerald Godfrey Private Collection of Fine Chinese Jades, sold in these Rooms, 30 October 1995, lot 903; and another with extensive scrollwork, illustrated by J. Rawson, Chinese Jade from the Neolithic to the Qing, London, 1995, no. 29.8, dated 16th-17th Century. The author refers to the Han dynasty predecessor for this style of rhyton, commenting that the dragon head at the base of the cup is a later invention "perhaps required in a Chinese context to provide a visual explanation for the source of the twisted bifurcated tip". Another finely carved example, dated to the mid Qing dynasty, is illustrated in Zhongguo Yuqi Quanji, Qing, vol. 6, no. 41. A smaller and highly animated rhyton from the collection of Dr. Ip Yee was included in the Hong Kong Museum of Art exhibition Chinese Jade Carvings, 1983, and illustrated in the Catalogue, no. 214.