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Identification and Creation

Object Number
1943.50.559
Title
Ornate Jade Disk
Classification
Ritual Implements
Work Type
disk
Date
206 BCE - 9 CE
Places
Creation Place: East Asia, China
Period
Han dynasty, Western Han period, 206 BCE-9 CE
Culture
Chinese
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/204537

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Barely translucent, brownish green and russet stone
Dimensions
0.7 x 23.6 cm (1/4 x 9 5/16 in.)
unspecified: 719 g
Inscriptions and Marks
  • inscription: incised along edge: 十四之五 (fifth of fourteen)

Published Text

Catalogue
Ancient Chinese Jades from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection in the Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University
Authors
Max Loehr and Louisa G. Fitzgerald Huber
Publisher
Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1975)

Catalogue entry no. 534 by Max Loehr:

534 Ornate Disk
Barely translucent, brownish green and russet stone polished to a glassy finish. This disk, similar to No. 530, is decorated with the “bucranium” scroll in the outer zone, a pattern of hexagonal elevations in the inner zone, and a rope-circle between them. While on No. 530 the heads and attached bands are outlined by neatly ground, evenly deep curvilinear grooves, here they are executed by thinly incised lines and harsh, abruptly applied straight grooves which are not integrated with the curvilinear configurations. The grooves of the grid pattern on the inner zone cut across the rope-circle, disfiguring it. Along the edge of the rim runs an inscription: wo pai(?) ssu shih, “five hundred(?) forty”; see the Introduction, section on inscriptions. Late Western or Early Eastern Han(?).

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop
Accession Year
1943
Object Number
1943.50.559
Division
Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact
am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Max Loehr and Louisa G. Fitzgerald Huber, Ancient Chinese Jades from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection in the Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University (Cambridge, MA, Fogg Art Museum, 1975)., cat. no. 534, p. 371
  • Jenny So, Early Chinese Jades in the Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 2019), pp. 282-3, cat. 39A

Verification Level

This record was created from historic documentation and may not have been reviewed by a curator; it may be inaccurate or incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu