CHINE, DYNASTIE QING (1644-1911)

The auspicious image of a qilin bearing books is a reference to the legend of the birth of Confucious, according to which a qilin with books on its back announced Confucious as a king without crown in the Zhou dynasty. See a very similar example of a jade qilin carrying books on its back in the collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in The Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum: Jadeware (III), Hong Kong, 1995, p. 114, pl. 94.