LATE SHANG DYNASTY, 13TH-11TH CENTURY BC

The thickness and unusual, angular form of this bird pendant suggests it may have been repurposed in antiquity from a larger jade carving, possibly a cong. Compare two jade bird-form pendants which are more naturalistically carved, but with similar flattened, broad bodies and angular scrolls decorating the wings, from the late Shang dynasty tomb of Fu Hao at Anyang, Henan province, illustrated in Yinxu Yuqi (The Jades from Yinxu), Beijing, 1982, pl. 63, nos. 380 and 381, which are identified as a young swallow and cormorant, respectively.