An archaic dark green jade ‘mask’ cong, Neolithic period, Liangzhu culture

拍品描述

Chinese Jades from the Ralph Wanger Collection Width 2⅞ in., 7.4 cm The present cong is remarkable in the freedom and sweetness of its rendering; ‘mouths’ described by broad scrolls and ‘noses’ defined by deeply curved indented sections between horizontal bands. While later, usually taller, cong bear a fairly consistent geometric design, the present cong joins a small number of recorded exceptions in which human mask designs rise prominently from the central cylinder full of character and distinction. Surviving examples of such sculptural and idiosyncratic design are rare. Compare a closely related cong of pale celadon color with similarly drawn features from the collection of Sir Joseph Hotung in the British Museum, London (accession no. 2022,3034.240) (Fig. 1), illustrated in Jessica Rawson, Chinese Jades from Neolithic to Qing, British Museum, London, 1995, cat. no. 3:3, where the author notes that several almost identical examples of this 'idiosyncratic form' have been uncovered from Yaoshan and Fanshan in Yuhan, Zhejiang and Wujiang in Jiangsu. Also compare another closely related cong of soft cream tone, preserved in the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco (accession no. B60J603) (Fig. 2) in René-Yvon Lefebvre d’Argencé, Chinese Jades in the Avery Brundage Collection, San Francisco, 1977, pl. XI; another of calcified stone excavated from Tomb 2 at Huiguanshan, Yuhang, Zhejiang in the Linping Museum of Jiangnan Cultures, in Gu Fang, The Complete Collection of Jades Unearthed in China, vol. 8: Zhejiang, Beijing, 2005, p. 134; a double-register cong of related green color uncovered from Tomb 137 at Xindili site, Tongxiang, Zhejiang, now in the Tongxiang Museum (ibid., p. 53); and another green example, of a slightly less defined bracelet shape and rougher incising, uncovered from Daimundun site, Pinghu, now in the Pinghu Museum, (ibid., p. 42).

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