Page 142 - A Re-examination of Late Qing Dynasty Porcelain, 1850-1920 THESIS

When you have taken possession of the Nine Brazen Tripods and put your hands
on the charts and registers, and when you have the emperor as hostage to rule the
empire, nobody in the world will dare not to obey you. 175

These words from an advisor to his sovereign prove the significance that early China

placed on the possession of supposed objects of power: in this instance, the famed bronze

tripods. 176 Once one possessed these wares, one would inevitably rule, because the ideas

of possession and authority were directly linked. The objects were symbols of authority

and a representation of rule over all China. It is the history of collecting and owning

these ritualistic objects that formed a basis for what became the collecting of fine art

objects, allowing porcelain to become a symbol of both power and authority within

China.

As time progressed, emperors claimed objects for themselves based more

exclusively on aesthetic tastes. Rosemary Scott has traced this development to the reign

of Emperor Wudi 漢武帝 (r. 140–87 BCE), who collected a series of calligraphy purely

for aesthetic value rather than the meaning of the calligraphy itself. 177 This practice was

undoubtedly the most important aspect of collecting within China, because it is the

advent of what is considered “court taste.” Court taste directly refers to what was

prevalent within the imperial court, which mainly reflected the taste of the current

emperor. The idea of court or imperial taste followed porcelain collecting throughout its

history, becoming an aesthetic passed down over generations. While the idea of a court

175 Rosemary E Scott, “The Chinese Imperial Collections,” in Collecting Chinese Art:
Interpretation and Display, ed. Stacey Pierson (London: School of Oriental and African Studies,
University of London, 2000), 19.
176 According to legend the nine bronze tripods were owned by emperor Yu and were passed
down from one ruler to the next. Ultimately, the tripods were lost sometime during the Zhou
dynasty. Reliefs from the Wu Liang Shrines, dating to the Han dynasty, include depictions of
Qin Shi Huangdi attempting to capture the vessels.
177 Scott, “The Chinese Imperial Collections,” 20.
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