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Identification and Creation

Object Number
1943.50.517
Title
Jade 'Bi' Disk
Other Titles
Alternate Title: pi
Classification
Ritual Implements
Work Type
disk
Date
possibly c. 4000 BCE - c. 2000 BCE
Places
Creation Place: East Asia, China
Period
Neolithic period
Culture
Chinese
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/204845

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Variegated apple-green serpentine with grayish white clouds
Dimensions
1 x 14.4 cm (3/8 x 5 11/16 in.)
unspecified: 308 g

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. 6 by Max Loehr:

6 Pi Disk
Variegated apple-green stone with grayish white clouds. Sturdy, fairly smoothly polished disk of a slightly uneven thickness, flawed by a depression that has not been worked off. Imperfectly circular, conical perforation drilled from one side. Neolithic(?). An X-Ray diffraction test undertaken by Cornelius S. Hurlbut, Jr., revealed the material to be serpentine.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop
Accession Year
1943
Object Number
1943.50.517
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. 6, p. 36

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