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Subject:Re: han dynasty sword slide and cicada
Posted By: adam Fri, Jul 18, 2014
Both interesting pieces... The sword slide appears to have the high polish i associate with high quality Han work, the cicada could be Ming? of all items, ones such as these are the toughest objects to evalute by image alone, this is perhaps nothing more than a feeling. (I bow to your knowledge Lee, I know a reasonable amount about jade but your knowledge certainly exceeds mine, in fact you are the only opinion I trust regarding jade on this site)...
Note- the jade seller who also sells "Genuine" "archaic" pieces under the counter, yet did not even recognize 2 of the 6 sacrificial jade objects--the most common and important jades of the archaic period when they were shown to him!!!
While on the topic of early jade....Are jade people on this site aware of the recent findings regarding Late Zhou to Han jades?
Good quality white jades generally age over time to varying shades of yellow from a creamy colour to a near mustard shade and can develop inclusion of many colours based on environmental factors,........ deep green jades (When rarely used, tended to stay a similar colour in small unaffected areas but over time the large areas of inclusion severely darkens to brownish tones).....
There is a type of jade much used in the later Zhou to Han dynasty that is a light mint green to bluish-green sometimes with dark inclusions
Often used for Bi disks for the obvious reason..
I have suspected (along with many others) that this is the product of local jade mining from indigenous Chinese mines that are now depleted/exhausted..
While it is certain that some Chinese indigenous jade was used in this period (There are references in contemporary literature to mountain locations and old mines have been discovered) a recent series of high level scientific investigations has revealed that many of the Han dynasty jade objects (in the material I discussed) were actually mined in Taiwan.
They tested the mineral contents and created a "Fingerprint" of the Han material and then tested many known jade sources and determined that the objects were certainly made from jade from within a localised area in Taiwan.
I very much doubt the objects were carved/worked there however and would suggest it is likely that stones were cut to a suitable size and shape in Taiwan before being brought into China for the royal workshops to complete their crafting.
Further proof (If any was needed)of the far reach and industriousness of the Han empire
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2007/11/19/science-jade-asia-dc-idUKL192379920071119
I attach 3 images as examples- one from the cleveland museum, one from beijing capital and one from my collection.... the photographing has largely removed the bluescale unfortunately
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