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The bottle, ? in. (1.8 cm.) high; weight 9.4 g
The George Eumorfopoulos (1863-1939) Collection. Sotheby's London, 5-6 June 1940, lot 503. Dr. Johan Carl Kempe (1884-1967) Collection, Sweden, before 1953, no. CK16. Sotheby's London, Masterpieces of Chinese Precious Metalwork. Early Gold and Silver, 14 May 2008, lot 38.
This superb miniature gold bottle is a fine example of the use of gold granulation, mostly seen on small articles or ornaments of Han and Six Dynasties date. The technique of granulation was developed in the ancient Near East as far back as the 3rd millennium BC, and first appeared in China on gold ornaments associated with the nomads of the northern plains at the end of the 4th century BC. By the Western Han period, 3rd century BC, this technique, in which tiny gold spheres are attached to a gold background by diffusion bonding rather than soldering, had been adopted by Chinese goldsmiths, and continued in popularity into the Six Dynasties period and through the Tang into the early Song periods.A similar miniature gold hu-form bottle with a link handle, that still retains its cover, is one of three miniature gold ornaments decorated with granulation, and dated to the Han dynasty, in the Nelson-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, illustrated by R. Soame Jenyns and William Watson, Chinese Art, The Minor Arts, New York, 1963, pp. 32-33, pl. 11. (Fig. 1) Gold granulation can also be seen on several miniature gold ornaments of Han-dynasty date found in high-ranking tombs illustrated by Yang Boda, 'Ancient Chinese Cultures of Gold Jewellery and Ornamentation', Arts of Asia, Vol. 38, No. 2, March-April 2008, pp. 100-102, pls. 39, 40, 42 and 43. Other small gold ornaments with granulation are illustrated in Celestial Creations: Art of the Chinese Goldsmith, The Cheng Xun Tang Collection, vol. I, Art Museum, Institute of Chinese Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2007, pls. B06A and B and pl. B11. A pair of similarly decorated gold bottles, attributed to the Eastern Han dynasty, is illustrated by Simon Kwan and Sun Ji, Chinese Gold Ornaments, Hong Kong, 2003, pl. 116.
