Period:Western Zhou dynasty Production date:11thC BC-8thC BC
Materials:jade, cinnabar (traces),
Technique:incised, bevelled,
Subjects:bird dragon
Dimensions:Length: 12.40 centimetres Width: 2 centimetres
Description:
Handle of green jade, almost totally calcified, surface pitting and small traces of cinnabar. This long rectangular handle decorated similarly on both sides in bevelled-cut incisions representing a bird in profile with elaborate crest feathers, hooked beak and standing on taloned feet. The bird flanked at either end by dragons’ heads.
IMG
![图片[1]-handle BM-2022-3034.94-China Archive](https://chinaarchive.net/Western Zhou dynasty/Jades/218_.jpg)
Comments:Shang/Western Zhou. Length 124mm. Width 22mm. See Hayashi 1991a, and Rawson 1995, pp.235-236, cat.no.13.3. Both the grip section and the main part of this handle are almost completely flat and barely indistinguishable from one another, the main difference being a slightly curved outline to the grip. At the bottom of the handle is a tapered flange, which must have fitted into the flanges and other stones that probably embellished this end. The design of a bird entwined with dragons does not take into account the division between handle and grip. The bird stands at the centre of the main part of the handle; a tail plume curls over the head of the bird and above the plume, and within the grip section is a dragon’s head also surrounded by a plume. A second dragon’s head can be identified among the scrolls that lie beneath the leg of the bird. In both cases the dragons can be located by their eyes. As was customary in the early Western Zhou, the incised lines vary both in depth and in their angle to the main plane. Handles decorated with incised birds and dragons were among the most elaborate of all Western Zhou jades and were one of the principal jade types to be abandoned before the beginning of the Eastern Zhou although some early examples survived into later periods. Handles of the Shang and early /Western Zhou have come from late Eastern Zhou tombs at Qufu in Shandong province.
Materials:jade, cinnabar (traces),
Technique:incised, bevelled,
Subjects:bird dragon
Dimensions:Length: 12.40 centimetres Width: 2 centimetres
Description:
Handle of green jade, almost totally calcified, surface pitting and small traces of cinnabar. This long rectangular handle decorated similarly on both sides in bevelled-cut incisions representing a bird in profile with elaborate crest feathers, hooked beak and standing on taloned feet. The bird flanked at either end by dragons’ heads.
IMG
Comments:Shang/Western Zhou. Length 124mm. Width 22mm. See Hayashi 1991a, and Rawson 1995, pp.235-236, cat.no.13.3. Both the grip section and the main part of this handle are almost completely flat and barely indistinguishable from one another, the main difference being a slightly curved outline to the grip. At the bottom of the handle is a tapered flange, which must have fitted into the flanges and other stones that probably embellished this end. The design of a bird entwined with dragons does not take into account the division between handle and grip. The bird stands at the centre of the main part of the handle; a tail plume curls over the head of the bird and above the plume, and within the grip section is a dragon’s head also surrounded by a plume. A second dragon’s head can be identified among the scrolls that lie beneath the leg of the bird. In both cases the dragons can be located by their eyes. As was customary in the early Western Zhou, the incised lines vary both in depth and in their angle to the main plane. Handles decorated with incised birds and dragons were among the most elaborate of all Western Zhou jades and were one of the principal jade types to be abandoned before the beginning of the Eastern Zhou although some early examples survived into later periods. Handles of the Shang and early /Western Zhou have come from late Eastern Zhou tombs at Qufu in Shandong province.
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