? A RARE AND LARGE DARK GREEN JADE ‘PHOENIX’ CEREMONIAL AXE BLADE, SHANG-WESTERN ZHOU DYNASTY Expert authentication: Dr. Gu Fang has examined the present lot and confirms its authenticity and the dating above, noting the style of cutting, workmanship, thickness and quality of stone with decomposed areas indicating burial all suggest a dating to ca. 1600-771 BC. He assessed it as a piece of notably good quality. A signed copy of Dr. Gu's expertise, dated 15 February 2023, accompanies this lot.
Dr. Gu Fang (born 1962) is an internationally renowned scholar of Chinese art and a leading authority on jades. He graduated from the Department of Archaeology at the prestigious Beijing University in 1986 and later studied at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), where he now serves as a Senior Fellow specializing in archaeological excavations and Chinese jade research. A former visiting scholar at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, he has authored several books on Chinese jades, including the 15-volume The Complete Collection of Jades Unearthed in China (2007), one of the most comprehensive studies of its kind, as well as Chinese Jade: The Spiritual and Cultural Significance of Jade in China (2012).
China, 1600-771 BC. The wide flattened blade with a beveled, curved cutting edge and a large central aperture drilled from both sides below a further small circular hole. One side holding the openworked silhouette of a stylized phoenix. The haft, rectangular in shape, with one chamfered edge. The opaque stone bearing variegated hues of dark mossy green, accented with light green and brown patches and inclusions.
Provenance: From a private collection in New York.
Condition: Very good condition, commensurate with age, with expected wear, signs of weathering and erosion, including areas of calcification and encrustation, few minute nicks, nibbling to edges, some of which has smoothened over time.
Weight: 323 g
Dimensions: Height 26 cm
Expert’s note: The present axe head is rare and unusual in that it follows the bronze prototypes more closely than any other example found in public or private collections. See a related bronze axe-head, dated to the Western Zhou dynasty, 15 cm high, in the Henan Museum, Zhengzhou, China. This ceremonial axe blade was an ancient long-handled weapon and instrument of execution, symbolic of noble authority. Evidence suggests that these axes played a part in ritual beheadings in addition to being symbols of power. Almost central holes also dominate several other early bronze axes, including two from Panlongcheng in Hubei province.
Literature comparison:
Compare a related dark green jade axe blade with similar curved edge and large central hole, Western Zhou dynasty, 14.4 cm long, found at the Necropolis of State Guo, Sanmenxia, Henan Province, now in the Henan Provincial Museum, and illustrated in Gu Fang, The Complete Collection of Jades Unearthed in China, vol. 5, Beijing, 2005, p. 125.
Auction result comparison:
Type: Related
Auction: Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 31 May 2023, lot 3005
Price: HKD 444,500 or approx. EUR 52,500 (converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing)
Description: An archaic calcified jade notched axe, Shang dynasty
Expert remark: Compare the related flattened shape with wide, curved edge and large central aperture. Note the smaller size (10.2 cm).
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