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AN OPAQUE MOTTLED OLIVE-GREEN AND BUFF JADE DISC, BI
- NEOLITHIC PERIOD, LIANGZHU CULTURE, 3RD MILLENIUM BC

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AN OPAQUE MOTTLED OLIVE-GREEN AND BUFF JADE DISC, BI
NEOLITHIC PERIOD, LIANGZHU CULTURE, 3RD MILLENIUM BC
Estimate
(Set Currency)
    $15,000 - $20,000

Sale Information

Sale 2405
Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art Including Property from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections
25 March 2010
New York, Rockefeller Plaza





Lot Description

AN OPAQUE MOTTLED OLIVE-GREEN AND BUFF JADE DISC, BI
NEOLITHIC PERIOD, LIANGZHU CULTURE, 3RD MILLENIUM BC
The walls of the central hole drilled from both sides and retaining drill marks, the greyish-olive stone now opaque and with extensive buff alteration; together with a greyish-green jade cong, Northwest China, 2nd-1st millenium BC, the grey-green stone with areas of opaque buff alteration, traces of cinnabar
7 7/8 in. (20 cm.) diam. and 2 3/8 in. (6 cm.) square (2)

Lot Condition Report
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Provenance

Both: A.W. Bahr Collection, Weybridge, 1963.

Exhibited

Bi: The Arts of China, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1973-1978.

Lot Notes

The opacity and distinctive markings in the stone of the bi are similar to that of one in the Art Institute of Chicago, also ascribed to the Liangzhu Culture, illustrated by E. Pearlstein in "Salmony's Catalogue of the Sonnenschein Jades in the Light of Recent Finds", Orientations, Selected Articles from 1983-1996, p. 130, fig. 1. See, also, the similar Liangzhu bi of comparable size (23 cm.) excavated from Fuquanshan, Qingpu county, Shanghai, illustrated in Gems of Liangzhu Culture, Shanghai Museum and Urban Council, Hong Kong, 1992, pp. 166-7, no. 60.

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