Han dynasty eyebrow brush



This item was said to be (it translated as) an 'eyebrow brush'. It dates from the Han dynasty and as I found out a little more it seems that these were likely typical items for fashion conscious women of the period. I have since seen other examples of these brushes, the others quite plain, and found out a little more about their use.
The example I have is a finer version, it is gold gilt along its entire length (although obscured by heavy patina in these pictures) and has a dragon head at the perforated end. This seems to be a standard motif for the item but the dragon here is better formed than on the simpler versions.
The example here has the same dragon motif (not shown), it also appears to have been broken and repaired judging by the bulge along the stem.



Most people I have shown this item to recognise it as a pipe if I was to ask them what it is, but the 'bowl' in the all examples I have seen typically has the trace remains of the bristles that were in the brush. The body is not hollow, and while the ancient Chinese commonly used hemp from ancient times for its oil and fibre only magicians used cannibis for its intoxication.
[url=http://www.rexresearch.com/hhist/hhist1~1.htm#china]http://www.rexresearch.com/hhist/hhist1~1.htm#china[/url] hemp


The angle set at 90' would be quite suitable to facial make-up but doesn't seem to be around in the facial brushes I can recall modern women using. With a small hand-held mirror it may have been more versatile to use a brush in this way since the hand won't obscure the face.
The mirrors used in the Han period were polished bronze, and not the large wall mirors we use today of glass. One white-bronze example with some ancient characters from the Han dynasty I have posted at; http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php?showtopic=8153

Heavy malachite patina obscured the dragons head and it was assumed that gold was under the patina too. I did decide to clear one side.



The side I have cleaned over several days using a mild acid and fine tools. This did not visibly affect the patches of remaining gold gilding as the malachite dissolved and a close inspection under magnification revealed gold visible at tiny clear points along the whole of this item. I do not intend to clean it further. I inked the face with a liquid solution to highlight the details, which is a trick from model painting. This makes the expression of the dragon quite clear, and it shows a rather fierce looking dragon with long pointed ears. The head itself is about 1cm accross.
For an even finer cast detail & a dragons face see; http://z8.invisionfree.com/Bronze_Age_Cent...hp?showtopic=18



For some information of cosmetics and beauty standards of the Han some determined googling found a number of references...and confirmed the importance of eyebrows in beauty. These brushes were used to 'paint' on the delicate eyebrows that desirable women were expected to have.

West Han woman, Yangling tomb complex......mid second century BC


http://www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/e2004/e200411/p60.htm
http://members.aol.com/bkdonnclass/Chinalife.html
{While Tang descriptions of beauty are more common than Han information this Tang article mentioned fashion from West Han & East Han eyebrows briefly;}
"

Another history text; 'Empires Ascendent' describes Han dynasty fashion and also mentioned these eyebrow shapes changing over time from pointed to arched.

West Han woman, Yangling tomb complex......mid second century BC

http://www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/p58.htm
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Awesome! Thanks Kenneth.

Eric

A Han dynasty canister. Very much the size of a container for 35mm film and strikingly modern and precise in dimensions.



This is an item of uncertain function, although it appears standard examples occur in the Han period. I had a note sent from Taiwan on this which said that 2 ideas are suggested in discussion and that it is either a container for a drug, like an anaesthetic for animals or else held a material similar to how Westerners would seal a document with a wax seal.
It must not have held other objects, like needles, since otherwise examples like mine (sealed shut) would contain the objects. It must be something that rarely survives, a compound. In time, if not already, I expect sealed air tight examples will answer the question. I seem to favour the idea it is for medicine or cosmetic material as West Han personal kits contain many small containers. The preseved lacquerware of Lady Xin being one example.


The geometrically precise shape of this canister suggests a good deal of care was put into its manufacture.
This is enabled by the long tradition of Chinese casting 'egg shell thin' bronzes and having large centres of bronze skill and centuries of experiece. This is not to say flaws and imperfections do not occur in ancient Chinese bronze but that none are apparent here. This is as a result of China's quite unique development of bronze working by casting alone. The fact Chinese never worked sheets is perhaps why they never developed work hardened bronze, not have comparible silverware to the ancient near-east and West, yet as a centre of fine bronze casting & precision the Chinese excelled over other regions. This casting technology is the strongest evidence for a totally independent development of bronze culture in China.
I discussed the thin casting of ancient China with an experimental archaeologist; Jeroen Zuiderwijk http://1500bc.com/bronzeage/index_eng.html


The thin cord which connected the lid and the body seems preserved in patina at this point. Another fabric is shown at this same point as a small honey comb design.

The lid is still attached and there is apparently material inside the vessel. There is a small hole where dirt could have washed in over the mellenia and so I am not going to remove the lid on the slim chance some evidence of the contents may still remain. It am fairly certain all that would be inside in this case will be a block of yellow soil.


Edit;
Last night in handling this cannister I noticed a piece of grit in my hand. Sometime a small piece of patina (grain sized) comes of bronzes and so I rubbed it between my fingers to see if it was soil or patina. The material was very soft, spread with ease and was of an orange-red colour.
It was clearly not either. I took a geuss it was from inside and so I shook out another small grain or two and rubbed it on a piece of white paper to see the orange-red colour more clearly. It was vaguely similar to red ochre I have found on pre-European sites in NZ for its colour, yet it was very very fine textured material.
The texture was akin to boot polish that has dried out, or a cosmetic that has dried out. The material today could be very dessciated compared to the past however, and the lump in the cannister may have compressed from a more liquid solution. Only a lab test might confirm what it is.
Is it poison?.....I'll get back to you. I feel it is possibly a pigment, and something akin to an ochre or paint because of its colour and also the texture.

This is a taotie 'beast mask' ring handle from a bronze vessel. It is a form that is nearly universal on Han vessels, including being formed on ceramic vessels despite being non-functional as a decorative relief since the ceramic versions are rough & set to the surface.
These masks appear on bronze vessels in the late East Zhou also.


Bronze vessels become less restricted to ritual over time (i.e ritual vessels in Shang and the West Zhou) and by the Han period a variety of mundane wine and food containers and cooking vessels occur.

These cast bronze vessel were not restricted to the nobility or ancestor rites and the decorative cast intricate details decline in favour of utilitarian shapes. In the East Zhou inalid silver & gold became a way of adding interest to the plainer shaped vessel and intricate patterns occur. It is thought this was in part due to competition from the emergence of decorated wooden laquerwares. Examples of wooden vessels from the Han period (typically in red & black primarily) show a similar spiraling patern and curvilinear art as the inlaid art of East Zhou & Han.
One cast deocorative element which remains on vessels in the Han are the taotie masks. These are named taotie after the disembodied eyes and bodiless spirits depicted on Shang era ritual vessels. Given the mundane nature of many of these vessels in Han it seems the religious iconography gives way to a simple motif, which by the Imperial period was representing a beast or animal in some examples instead of the mysterious 'greedy' spirits of Shang ritual. I find the striking disemodied eyes on the earliest Shang objects much more enigmatic than the decoration on later vessels, as even by late Shang the creature was depicted with some elements of a face and possibly even claws & horns. (see pics here, although better earlier 'eye' examples can be seen in a review of texts.)
http://www.marymount.k12.ny.us/marynet/Tea...ct/html/art.htm

The meaning of the Taotie is lost and even the Shang word is not known (also I believe it possibly linked to eye masks on neolithic Liangzhu jade objects) and yet this later motif is often still called a taotie or animal mask when discussing the Han vessels. It shows some continuity with the animal masks on West Zhou shields I have posted on CHF ancient arsenal forum & simplified taotie masks occur on East Zhou swords also so the evolution can be traced in this way.
By this time it seems the original meaning of the taotie was already lost and what was a dozen centuries earlier a religious icon and likely associated with sacrifical rituals was later a decorative space filler on objects that were used in household or domestic duties.
Here is one of many examples of plain ring handled vessels. This example from early West Han, Shaanxi.

Once again, great stuff Kenneth. I love ancient bronze-wares, but I don't know which I like more, bronze-wares, porcelains, or lacquer-ware products!

Eric

...I'm not quite finished Eric This is an on-going thread. Personally I like bronze, as you may have geussed but I think model ceramics in particular are excellent for preserving scenes and people so that we can study them as they were in life.

Han Chariot fixtures
Even in the West Han period the battlefield chariot still lingers on despite its decline after the introduction of horse archers in the Warring States period. The determined breeding and improving of horse stocks during Wudis reign means that chariot fixtures, already simplified from their Shang & Zhou examples, drop out of the archaeological record with the end of battlefield chariots. see last post;
http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.php?threadid=44473

After this date the rarity of fixtures or new forms suggests both that the chariot was finally obselete as a weapon, the tombs of the period did not contain full sized chariots, and the last examples that survive are transport rather than combat vehicles. These full sized chariots, as transport, do not seem to be buried in tombs and so parasol tips evolutions traced in Chinese texts show these fittings up to ShiHan/West Han.

Han period chariot fixtures, gold gilded parasol tips. The circle of tips left by a rotted chariot parasol is clear in this thread.
http://z8.invisionfree.com/Bronze_Age_Cent...hp?showtopic=15
I have since seen quite a number of plain minature axle pins (one dealer even being unaware what they were) and have 2 examples as well. These are from minature chariots, which in JingDi's time are still accompanying troops in minature buried armies. Some of these Han examples may represent minature transport carriages rather than war chariots however since ceramic scenes of life become more popular in the east Han and scenes such as shown on the swordforum link of the bronze carriages/chariots may have been rendered in wooden minatures also. One of the minature pins I have still has the wood of the axle in it and well as a small pin fused onto the axle cap.

At least up untill Wudi's time, and certainly JingDi (as these examples come from his tomb complex) full sized chariots were still buried in some occasions, with a link all the way back to the Shang & Zhou chariot pits. These gold plated fixtures were attached to the poles of the parasols above chariots.
This is one decorative feature on the increasingly less gaudy chariots after the early East Zhou. The complexities of fittings decline but the Han took to gilding of bronze in a way earlier bronzes do not have.
It has been suggested new techniques of fire gilding, beading and mercury gilding all occur in the Han period. Unlike the inlay of East Zhou wire and sheets this gold is fused to the bronze.


This is an example of a fixture with gold gilding in my own collection, again the patina obscures what is an entirely gold covered tube. There is a heavy cerrusite patina on this piece. The lack of patina above cold either be due to the purity of the gold on an Imperial version or else a cleaning at the Chinese museum. The lustre of gold never comes accross in my photographs but after several attempts I gave up trying.
The patina which blocks the gold from view is primarily copper based and apparently lead also. Copper was added to the gold in some fire gilding, but impurities also exist by accident. Lead was said to be added to silver gilding in one texts account.


Here is a trace of the wood from the pole inside the tube. The wood is mostly decayed but an imprint remains. Some organic fibres do survive at points but most is just an imprint.


As an example of the parasol above the chariot here is a nobleman accompanying a hunting party. These scenes are on tomb lintels and fleeing animals are also often shown (and arrows in flight around them too).
The action of the scene and the crouching rider shows the swift pace of the chariot very well.

Eric just made an excellent post under the thread 'Han art' in which he saved me checking my own texts for the date which the Han invented paper (actually East Han) and at the same time attached some images of painted walls and tiles in Han tombs.
One image of chariots which I had not seen before has the same reoccuring theme of the parasoled chariots and horsemen. The proportions are almost exact to the carved stone lintels in West Han tombs.
It seems these scenes show the enjoyment of hunting & outdoor pursuits and the wish that this would continue in the next life.
Here is a painted version again showing these parasols above Han era chariots;


Attached here is another object thought to be a chariot fitting. This is just a geuss as my source said that many mystery items are just called 'chariot fittings' & untill a picture or finding of one in a clear context occurs what it attaches to is unknown. It was rivetted to a wooden object however. It is quite heavy, and the size of it and appearance immediately makes me think of a gear shift in a manual car.Untill it is revealed gear boxes fitted into chariots then a point to tie the reigns or a hand grip would be a better option.


This picture shows an area of damage, the hole for the rivets, and an amount of wood affixed inside the socket. A mixed patina of blue-green-opaque can be seen on the outside. Some crystalisation is visible inside the socket also although not seen here.


Many mystery fittings exist from ancient China, some quite modern looking components and hinges etc.
Here is one example of a fitting said to go atop a pole. These were found in the context of a minature burial pit of ceramic warriors and servants. The size is made typically 1/3 (people about 60cm tall in model form).
This means an object in the final total not too unlike the socketed bronze of my own so this shows it needn't be attached to a chariot and could have been on a door, a building, and flagpole etc.

Oh man, those are great pictures, Kenneth. All are from your personal collection?

Btw, how is TaoTie pronounced in chinese?

Everything with a scale ruler beside it is photographed from my study pieces. I have a number of smaller items I have posted before but this time I thought I would put some together.

The article above says Taotie is 'taow-tee-eh'.
Maybe I would sound it out 'Toww* Ti-eh' (*as in 'ouch-''oww'')
IIRC the word dates from Zhou times, so if the Shang called it something else is quite possible. The meaning is lost. The Zhou worshipped heaven/Tian instead of the Shang diety and since written texts only survive from later periods it seems elements of Shang belief are lost to time.
The earlier Shang examples exude a fierce feeling, and I don't think the evolution into the animal mask over centuries must mean it was seen in this way originally.
http://www.logoi.com/notes/beast.html
Various ideas are that it is was human devouring spirit, a greedy monster, and hungry spirit, and an 'ogre' in Shang times according to authors.
The earliest examples are bodiless eyes and I suspect the later addition of claws and jaws is more about art than reflecting the original creature. Given that Liangzhu jade forms occur in later Shang jades it is possible it comes from a neolithic belief system, these often show eye masks with only suggestions of a mouth or eyebrows on shamanistic plaques, cong tubes and bi discs. These repeating mask designs can be seen here;
http://www.liangzhuculture.com/
Some people say the taotie was placed on bronze vessels so that filling them would feed it. Some people say it devoured men, changed them but didnt kill them (like a shamans trance maybe? There is a famous Shang bronze of a huge beast devouring a very calm looking man who holds the beast like a mother. On this link it is called 'Tigher eats man' and a small picture can be seen. http://www.chinesemoods.com/chinesebronzes.html. The relaxed look of the man however means a shaman entering a trance has been suggested to explain too)
http://www.think-ink.net/guide/taotieh.htm

Other ideas are that is was a protector of the household and frightened enemies, a force to be respected. Just how it related to ancestor rites is not known, but a gateway is possible.

The Han examples and east Zhou examples have by then lost the meaning of sacrifice and ritual. They become more of an interest/decorative feature on otherwise plainer style bronzes.

'Jades' of the mortuary industry.
During the reign of Emperor Wendi the burial of bronzes, gold and jades was prohibited as the amount of luxuries being entombed with the nobility was draining the reconstruction of the country. This is why the tomb of Lady Xin famously contained a treasure trove of silks and wooden lacquerware. This was in the period of rebuilding that Wendi is remembered for but it demonstrates just how serious the burial of tomb objects was in the Han period.
Outfitting tombs was serious industry in ancient China. Less resourced people emulated the trappings of the ruling class with their own versions of ceramics & burial bronzes. Ceramics, bronze & jade (in that order) are typical tomb items. Different degrees of care were invested in these items according to the means of the tomb occupant. A quality review of ceramic warriors and servants detail and non functional minature/full sized burial weapons can show where some sacrifices in quality are made.

Jades in certain forms have a strong relation to the mortuary industry in Han, and the motifs of cicada and pig were items made for the tomb only. The pairs of pigs (crouching pigs) were placed in the hands of the corpse (symbolising wealth). This pair of nephrite pigs are more detailed in the facial features than most, since they typically have blunter noses.


A flat stylised cicada was placed in the mouth of the dead (symbolising rebirth, as in the emergance of the nymph from the soil). The example here is quite typical of nephrite examples


Burial jades as face masks occur in the Zhou period, placed in contact with the body after being stitched to a face cover of silk. Simpler versions were jade orifice plugs which trapped the vital chi (breath of life) when blocking the apertures of the body. These jade plug sets served a purpose of sorts.
Jade was incorrectly thought to prevent decay.
By the time of the Han dynasty full suits of fitted plaques were made, reporting taking 10 years to make. These were reserved for the Imperial family, although the King of Nanyue defiantly went to the grave in a jade suit and accompanied by women and servants despite a Han ban on human sacrifice.

These nephrite jade items represent the luxury and care with which the nobility and priveleged could invest in the afterlife. For other folk burial jades could be made of glass (although supposedly not a cheap option) or more commonly the softer forms of yu 'jade'.....serpentine, calcite and a variety of similar appearing minerals.
Nephrite (true jade) being the top class, Jadeite unknown until Ming, and a various other stones used as subsititutes.

The items below are all soft stone 'Yu' jade and emulate the forms of mortuary jades, or the expensive versions, that fashion dictated. The broken bi ('huan' type disc) is a soft translucent opaque material which could be carved into shape with a blade unlike jade. The repair is poorly done, some small fragments apparently missing and the actual placement of the pieces perhaps incorrect.
When light is held up behind this disc its translucent quality suggests why it may have been used as a nephrite subsitute. The form & pattern/decoration of this is a rough copy of the true bi that occur in the Han period. The broken disc has a green hue when viewed from the reverse.
The plaques are a slightly harder mineral either calcite or a related mineral. The powdery surface of these plaques is much like the appearance of ancient calcite carving in non-Chinese forms. The chemical reaction to white vinegar of these plaques, a fizz, means it is in the same family as marble/calcite/limestone.
The stylised cicada is a very soft stone, almost like soapstone in feel, and the reverse shows the signs of an unfinished cut across the broad surface to reduce the thickness of the piece. It may have not been finished, or else is fairly crude. These flat forms were made to be placed in the mouth of the corpse.


Edit; I found this short article on 'crouching pigs' also called 'recling pigs in this version.
http://www.asianart.com/exhibitions/shandong/23.html

The small soft stone plaques above were said to be belt ornaments, and other similar items called 'jade part of clothes'. I have an example in a text of square jade plaques attached to a leather belt which dates from a past-Tang item.


It is possible it is just an ornamentation but there is a particular association of other jade plaques with the mortuary industry.
As an example of true jade (nephrite) plaques are these examples below. These were from the same source and I regret not buying them with hindsight. My wife was a little creeped out by these items so associated with dead people (i.e cicadas and plaques) and so I thought I should voluntarily take a brief break from burial objects. Actually I was meaning to make a bid, but waited to the last minute and then got distracted and missed the deadline. These low quality images will have to do.
These look finer & more delicate than my calcite plaques, and more correct on the surface for altered nephrite.



One of the reasons they would have been good for study is this curious 'X' feature on this plaque. It can be compared to the West Han burial suit below.
The 'X' could be a scoring mark to align drilled holes during jade carving or could be an alteration from contact with a thread or wire. The pictures are too poor to tell.



To make sense of these plaques compare the suit here, such complete suits were reserved for the Han imperial family(**2) but this belonged to the King of Nanyue (in Guandong). He had aspirations of greatness, was buried in Imperial finery and even defied the Han ban on human sacrifice (*1). He was buried with several servants and females.



The 'X' pattern on the stitching (here silk thread (*1) but in other Han Imperial suits it was gold thread (*3) can be seen on the body plaques. These plaques were joined together in a manner like lamellar armour, being stitched directly together.
These suits were thought to prevent decay based on ancient Chinese alchemists advice, but failed, and such tombs are found with deflated empty suits which are then restored by archaeologists. (*2)
Of course common folk or even lesser nobillty and officials may not be able to pay somebody to create such nephrite suits, alleged to took 10 years of labour.
In this way part suits, like face covers are found in other well stocked Han graves, i.e face covers and jade pigs in one text example of excavation. ( I have since found some internet images of the items from my text...*5)
Another type of item was a set of plugs, for blocking all the apertures of the body ( placed on the '9' apertures such as the facial, genital & excretive) (*4). This was thought to hold in the 'chi' or life force which still remained at death, and thereby prevent decay. All this was to keep the flesh of the body in a jade-like state of permanance, just like these suits survived.
Sets of shaped plugs for trapping in the residual 'breath of life' are another type of jade reserved for mortuary functions only. That glass and other stones were subsituted for jade on occasion (like cicadas and pigs) leads me to speculate that the soft stone calcite versions are also likely 'jades' made to cover the body in the tomb.





Edit; To illustrate some of these points above, I have since found a few related articles and images on the same theme. These internet articles repeat some points I made above, which are based on my various readings in the past. I have added in examples at post #13 here. I have inserted *1-5 as footnotes which I explain shortly so as not to clutter this post.

As an example of the broader types of stone considered 'jade' in ancient China are these ritual gui/tablets, from Yangling & West Han.


I saw these at Xianyang and remembered the powdery look of the surface. Also in this text these and other jades from the peripheral sites looked on the surface to be calcite. These items had the kind of powdery & chalky surface more often seen on calcite objects, but this is not a definite identification. Nephrite jade when it alters to white often retains a certain gloss or lustre in comparison to calcite whitening. This is because a true jade alters to white through a change in the crystal structure of the surface, kind of like how clear ice (translucent) and snow (white) are the same substance but react differently under reflected light.
Nephrite then can appear bone-white, but still has a gloss and is the same mineral...and if oiled can lift the colour beneath and reveal such jades colour, i.e green.
Nephrite jade can 'calcinate' or have material affix from the surface so there are a range of alterations but in general nephrite can retain a gloss while calcite whitens quite dull. The powdery surface of calcite seems to be akin to decay or acid soils action and hence my fancy some jades like shown here may not be nephrite.

For examples of nephrite altered to bone-white there are a number of jades from Yunnan and the Dong Son culture (broadly Southeast Asian) which I have posted as thumbnails on http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php?showtopic=5505 Some of the whitening of these nephrite jade objects is shown on that thread.
These also goes to show how calcite can operate as a subsitute, or a semi-precious stone, in the same manner as a 'hard' jade. The Dong Son items of calcite have different forms to the nephrite versions, i.e bangles and bracelets mostly with finer & thinner/delicate versions existing in nephrite. On the surface the colour and translucency of polished softer calcite can be comparible to nephrite jade althought there is a difference in touch, texture, hardness & even tone when struck which ranks nephrite jade as the most highly regarded mineral.

To show some Dong Song/Yunnan jades and the plaques together I paired up these objects.


The upper paired disc/core and plaque appearance are comparible to the Yangling 'jades'.
The middle disc/core and plaque are very decayed, chalky feeling and powdery looking.
The lower plaque and the broken bracelet of calcite show some of the original colour, a blue green in this instance.
All of these items I identified as calcite (or a related mineral in the limestone to marble spectrum) by getting a reaction from white vinegar, the surfaces can be seen to fizz from a single drop under magnification.



As a close up of the calcite colours here are the two lower paired objects. The Yunnan bracelet I repolished at one small point to reveal the colour and translucency. It shows masses of plant root imprints cemented/bonded onto the surface from its burial.
It does show that while calcite lacks several of the qualities true jade was admired for it still can have a translucency and colour similar to nephrite jade. Calcite objects I have seen can be glassy/opaque white, to blue green, to a true lime green.
The plaque here shows traces of a green stain, supposedly malachite from a copper or copper alloy object. Other plaques show signs that suggest a bronze wire of thread was connecting via the drilled holes.
I have seen a green patina traces added to a fake jades in the past so this in itself is not something I consider very visually meaningful and far as indicating age. The eroded surfaces are a better indicator on these plaques. I cannot be sure that a chemical couldn't replicate this surface on calcite but given that they correspond to the Yunnan jades gifted to me by a much more experienced jade collector (and with various other good signs the Yunnan jades are authentic) I am fairly satisfied these are real ancient plaques. Jade is rather more difficult to judge as ancient than the types of bronzes I tend to focus on, with their peculiar patinas, and something like the clean soft-stone cicada I showed earlier is almost impossible to confirm as ancient. Only by considering the source can I say 'should be'.
One other feature, which by itself is not certainly an indicator of age, is that these plaques have clearly lost quite a lot of mass to decay. There are harder quartz-like areas in the calcite that seem to be a tougher material and these can be seen undermagnification to be polished flat, and yet the surface of the decayed calcite has retreated from these areas as they corroded so left these pillars of harder material. This shows the original surface of the very polished translucent plaques and just how much has decayed away to leave the rounded, powdery and dull-white versions today.

The following may be useful to make sense of my comments in post #11, and references to ''jade'' plugs, etc. in my ongoing article.
Where relevent I have inserted (*#)
*1; some images of the Nanyue burial suit on these links...&

http://www.travelchinaguide.com/attraction...nanyue_king.htm


http://www.newsgd.com/pictures/scenery/200308120143.htm

*2; Imperial Han jade suits
http://www.nga.gov/education/chinatp_sl16.shtm
The jade suit of Dou Wan in situ in the tomb. {see the deflated suit as it was found in an image here}



*3: http://gallery.sjsu.edu/oldworld/asiangate...-tombs-page.htm





*4: http://www.asianart.com/exhibitions/shandong/24.html





*5; http://www.asianart.com/exhibitions/shandong/21.html

The 'bi' type disc (circular slab with with a central hole) which I showed earlier is a form which comes from Neolithic times and continued to the very last dynasty as an art form. It is a ritual jade in Zhou times and the meaning is speculated as a symbol of heaven (Chinese believing the heavens were circular based on the movement of celestial bodies).
i.e; http://www.chicochai.com/NAVIGATION%20MENU/Glossary.html
""In the Zhou Dynasty, the use of jade was first regulated in Zhouli, or the Rites of the Zhou, which was the 'constitution' of the Zhou Dynasty, and addressed matters such as politics, economics, military affairs, diplomacy and law. Together with two other classic texts, the Yili (or Rites) and subsequently, Liji (Book of Rites), national rites and etiquette and guiding philosophy were strictly stipulated. In the Zhouli alone, there were dozens of articles concerned with the use and function of jade during different occasions such as politics, sacrifices, alliances, and military activities, etc. According to the three classics, a special ministry should be set up to manage jade use. It was stipulated that six jade ritual items should be made in order to offer sacrifice to heaven, the earth, the east, the south, the west and the north. There were also strict regulations concerning the six jade tablets that were used by emperors, dukes, marquises, earls, viscounts and barons, respectively. According to the functions listed in the three classics, Jade ware could be divided into the following categories - ritual utensils, funerary utensils, accessories, currency, weapons, diplomatic gifts, musical instruments and food. Simple carving, careful handling and keeping separate private and public ritual vessels, were some of the basic rules to follow in the use of jade.""

The broken & repaired disc I photographed along with the calcite plaques and roughed out cicada is a very soft stone with a slight green tinge.
With the term 'Yu' (jade) including many much softer stones, such as serpentine ''jade'' or Xiu yu in Chinese & from Xiuyan County in Liaoning Province, this should be seen as a substitute for the much harder jade (like nephrite), which is certainly what Confucius is meaning when he identifies 9 qualities of jade as a metaphor for a gentleman. Nephrite jade is the jade which Chinese regarded highly, and typically this and jadeite are still highly regarded today.
That pottery bi have turned up is another suggestion that on occasion the form of the object may be as important as the material (?) A number of pottery 'bi' (ritual discs) were found in the tomb of the King of Nanyue. This is a bit of a mystery given the extravagance of his tomb, yet here is another example of an item said to be a pottery 'bi'. This is apparently a substitution, and perhaps the bi form in the tomb acts as a talisman (or perhaps as with other ceramics it may have been to translate into the spirit world in the way ceramic people would serve the deceased in the afterlife. It may have then been as good as jade to the dead).


My soft stone example was said to be from the Spring & Autumn period by the seller, but I don't have any conclusion on it. The form is still valid in this thread as the bi was very popular and often very delicately made and decorated in the Han period. On Han versions the spiral or 'tadpole' decorations could be very tiny and the works of jade bi became very fine. I would consider this soft stone example then in a broad East Zhou to Han style.
A comparable example below is from a text, it is from the Warring States period and is a little over 5cm in diameter.


The designs are said to be 'tadpole' like, and perhaps reflecting germinating seeds, or in a cluster like this a representation of the land. It does look in this example very much like the a motif on some Yunnan/Dian bronzes which on those items represents land in between clouds and sea.
Since the meaning is speculative it is enough to note the common depictation, even in tiny bead form, of this 'tadpole' design on the finer nephrite jades.

Features of this jade that are in common are the small size and proportion (being a huan type disc, with a medium sized central hole).
One aspect of ancient jade I haven't touched on much yet is that imprecise proportions are basic implication of authenticity. A variation in the thickness or symmetry in a piece before the advent of modern tools, to saw and shape jade, is taken as a good sign on ordinary ancient jades.
The hand finished look to this Warring States jade and the uneven bordering rim as well as slight variation in thickness and position of the central hole is one feature of hand carved jade. The drilled holes on many ancient jades can be seen to not meet quite perfectly, or little adjustments to tooling or carving lines may not be entirely removed. Of course jades for the Han Imperial family will not tolerate imperfections, but even in text book jades some irregularities can be seen from Neolithic to ancient dynasties jade. A general similarity between the broken disc I photographed and the tooling on this version above can be seen.

To return to some features on the soft stone jade here, the presence of red ochre on a jade shows a practice of ancient Chinese. Ochre on jades, and other burial objects can be seen as a red layer on the surface and is quite distinct to the typical yellow soil of China. I have seen ochre added to fake artefacts too, and will return to discuss the various features on these item surfaces shortly. In that instance it was a fake crouching-pig jade.
Ochre is fairly common on real ancient jades.
On the surface of this broken disc of mine a red layer added to the surface can be seen below the soil.


Here are 2 plain Nephrite bi from the West Han period, and ochre can be seen remaining as patches on the surface. Since it isn't the jade, and it isn't the soil, then this will be ochre.


A distinct asymmetry to the soft stone jade can be confirmed by measurements. The thickness of the disc slab is from 5-7mm and visually imperfect. The width of the decorated band varied from 19mm-20mm.
Along one edge here is a feature that when compared to the Yunnan jades very cemented root trace is quite similar. I tried in this instance to test that it wasn't an epoxy or resin added sneakily and used a chemical stripper (which could dissolve the glue holding the repair in a test) and it seems to confirm this is a cemented soil, and hence most likely a root mark. It is quite similar to root marks on other jades I have seen.


Another possible root mark is an odd feature where a short channel shape in the soil has a small tube/tunnel section of earth, quite hard to photograph since it really is tiny, but suggests a feature like a decayed root trace or even a burrowing insect perhaps. It is in the recess of the lower swirl, and about 5o'clock from the pictures centre.
A tiny touch of red ochre on the surface can also be seen.


To return to the Dong Son Yunnan jades as a comparison here is one image I attached to the Dong Son thread http://www.chinahistoryforum.com/index.php?showtopic=5505 which is worth adding as a text example of root marks and encrusted soil on a jade (here a Shang-era jade IIRC, possibly a bracelet)


To return to some of the authenticity features I have discussed in this thread;
Breaks and repairs; damage to real artefacts is quite common, especially ceramics. Forgers are known to break and repair fake ceramics in order to appear ancient in a test by x-ray. Whether this has been done to the soft jade disc is possible, although unlikely since it is unsightly and even missing some material at the break.
Malachite (green stains) on the surface; Malachite on jade occurs when bronze wire is used for jades or when contact occurs over a long time. Green rust or patina is added to fake bronzes, and I have seen a small amount added to a fake jade once before. Visually then basic green stains are not conclusive.
Uneven dimensions/misalligned drilling on jade; Something to be noted, and certainly present on many ancient jades, yet easily replicated if a faker wishes.
Ochre; Red ochre added to objects in burial was a practice in ancient China (as well as many cultures) yet I have seen red ochre added under the soil of one fake jade in the past. Ochre being present is not conclusive for identifying an ancient jade.
Whitening/Calcination/recrystalisation; A general whitening of nephrite jade, and even calcite, occurs naturally over long periods of time. Fakers can try to copy this but it is typically by extreme heat or chemicals and this destroys the lustre of nephrite even in a whitened form, since it means a damage to the surface. Some forms of whitening I would consider unlikely to be faked, as in nephrite jades that react to re-oiling the surface and are then quite discrete crystal changes.
Root marks; I haven't yet heard of root marks being faked, although I wouldn't assume it couldn't be done if a faker cared to bury a fake jade for a season, or a year. It does seem that really solid cemented and bonded roots like I have seen on several Yunnan jades are quite unlike the root marks on objects typically seen from seasonal gardening and its suggests a real long relationship between the traces of decayed roots on the surface, i.e bonded by the calcination itself and not achieved simply by waiting for a plant to grow around a fake jade. In instances then I consider really cemented root traces a sign of age.

In conclusion the surface features I have pointed out by themselves are not proof a jade piece is ancient but they are worth taking account of. Certain whitenings and bonded root traces would be much harder to fake than simply adding a basic feature to a surface. On bronzes there are certain types of features (specific crystalisations and fully mineralised fabrics, complex and varied patinas under magnification) that would make me completely confident in a great age to a piece but the collecting of jade is very problematic. It requires an honest source for the jade and an individual judgement of a piece. Of these cheaper soft stone pieces I am fairly confident these are ancient pieces based on the source in general and the item type, and rather more so about the calcite plaques and the broken disc.
Regardless these pieces have helped test my eyes and brain, and in explaining them on this thread I have been able to elaborate on many aspects of the common jades of the mortuary industry and burial practices in ancient China.
With the huge industry that went into furnishing graves in Han China these items are an important part of Han culture and belief.

Nice pictures of those artifacts. Nice statues. I always find it hard to think what people actually look like a 1000+years ago because we don't have super realistic paintings, pictures, etc. However those statues give you a good idea that people look just like us except for clothing (although I think there clothing looks somewhat better than what people wear today). I can only visit the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, California, USA to see stuff like above. I wish I could visit a Chinese archaeological museum/or go on a dig but I don't have any near where I live.