Period:Warring States period Production date:5thC BC – 2ndC BC
Materials:jade, cinnabar (traces),
Technique:polished, bevelled,
Subjects:dragon (?) mammal (tiger?) bird
Dimensions:Length: 12 centimetres
Description:
Dragon and bird huang pendant of translucent yellow jade with brown inclusions and areas of calcification and traces of cinnabar polished to a high gloss.
IMG
![图片[1]-pendant BM-2022-3034.144-China Archive](https://chinaarchive.net/Warring States period/Jades/210_.jpg)
Comments:The central panel of the huang is decorated with angular C-scrolls in relief between bevelled edges, the head with well-executed eye, a striated band from the mouth curling up to the snout and scale-like designs around the neck area. The tapering tail of the dragon also viewed as a long, hook-beaked bird with taloned striated claw and eye. Both sides similarly decorated. One perforation through the snout and another at the apex. Warring States Period. Length 120mm. See Rawson 1995, pp.270-271, cat.no.17:11, Stanford 1958, Salmony 1963, Min Chiu 1985, and Ecke 1961. This dramatic pendant is shaped like a comma, with a large dragon or tiger head, curved body and small, pointed tail. Both head and tail sections are smoothly polished with undulating surfaces. The head has a large snout, with smaller lower jaw, an eye and ear in profile and a double curve on the jaw-line. On both sides, between the head and the tail an bounded by near plain bands, is an area filled with double c-shaped curls that gleam in the light. There are two holes for suspension, one at the snout and the other at the centre of the arc. Scholars who have tried to reconstruct pendant sets have argues that pointed pendants, like this one, generally hung from the lowest part of the pendant group. In later terminology this type was known as xi. While pointed pendants are quite common in the Eastern Zhou and Han periods, their origins and evolution are by no means straightforward. Forms varied throughout the Zhou period but the main line of development was probably from a dragon-or tiger-headed pendant with a pointed body, seen in a quite clearly defined form in the seventh-century BC Huang state tombs at Henan Guangshan Baoxiangsi. Many later tombs have revealed examples with different forms of dragon head, including the sixth-century Qin state tombs at Shaanxi Baoji Yimen and the fifth-century tomb at Shanxi Lucheng xian, Luhe. The present pendant can be dated in part by the double c-shaped scrolls on its body that resemble carving of the fifth century BC, such as that in the tomb of the Marquis Yi of Zeng at Hubei, Sui xian Leigudun. Dragon pendants in the Art Institute of Chicago have similar, very evenly paired scrolls. A late survival of the pattern is found on an arc-shaped jade in a pendant set from the late second century BC tombs of the King of Nan Yue at Canton.
Materials:jade, cinnabar (traces),
Technique:polished, bevelled,
Subjects:dragon (?) mammal (tiger?) bird
Dimensions:Length: 12 centimetres
Description:
Dragon and bird huang pendant of translucent yellow jade with brown inclusions and areas of calcification and traces of cinnabar polished to a high gloss.
IMG
Comments:The central panel of the huang is decorated with angular C-scrolls in relief between bevelled edges, the head with well-executed eye, a striated band from the mouth curling up to the snout and scale-like designs around the neck area. The tapering tail of the dragon also viewed as a long, hook-beaked bird with taloned striated claw and eye. Both sides similarly decorated. One perforation through the snout and another at the apex. Warring States Period. Length 120mm. See Rawson 1995, pp.270-271, cat.no.17:11, Stanford 1958, Salmony 1963, Min Chiu 1985, and Ecke 1961. This dramatic pendant is shaped like a comma, with a large dragon or tiger head, curved body and small, pointed tail. Both head and tail sections are smoothly polished with undulating surfaces. The head has a large snout, with smaller lower jaw, an eye and ear in profile and a double curve on the jaw-line. On both sides, between the head and the tail an bounded by near plain bands, is an area filled with double c-shaped curls that gleam in the light. There are two holes for suspension, one at the snout and the other at the centre of the arc. Scholars who have tried to reconstruct pendant sets have argues that pointed pendants, like this one, generally hung from the lowest part of the pendant group. In later terminology this type was known as xi. While pointed pendants are quite common in the Eastern Zhou and Han periods, their origins and evolution are by no means straightforward. Forms varied throughout the Zhou period but the main line of development was probably from a dragon-or tiger-headed pendant with a pointed body, seen in a quite clearly defined form in the seventh-century BC Huang state tombs at Henan Guangshan Baoxiangsi. Many later tombs have revealed examples with different forms of dragon head, including the sixth-century Qin state tombs at Shaanxi Baoji Yimen and the fifth-century tomb at Shanxi Lucheng xian, Luhe. The present pendant can be dated in part by the double c-shaped scrolls on its body that resemble carving of the fifth century BC, such as that in the tomb of the Marquis Yi of Zeng at Hubei, Sui xian Leigudun. Dragon pendants in the Art Institute of Chicago have similar, very evenly paired scrolls. A late survival of the pattern is found on an arc-shaped jade in a pendant set from the late second century BC tombs of the King of Nan Yue at Canton.
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