Page 162 - Marchant Ninety Jades For 90 Years

八 86. Imperial rectangular cup stand with chamfered corners, gently flared lipped rim and straight foot, carved in high relief with two five-

十 clawed dragons each in pursuit of a flaming pearl, surrounding a relief shou character, encircled by a key-fret band beneath the upright

六 rim, the stone white.

7 ⅜ inches, 18.7 cm long; 5 inches, 12.7 cm deep.
雙 Qianlong, 1736-1795.
龍 Imperial openwork carved wood stand.
戯

珠 • From an important French private collection. Bequeathed to a convent near the city of Bordeaux and belonging to the religious
壽 order of nuns known as ‘Petites Soeurs des Pauvres’.
字
盞 • A similar imperial white jade cup stand together with its dragon-handled cup, bearing the mark Qianlong Yu Yong, ‘For the Use
托 of the Emperor Qianlong’, in the Qing Court Collection, is illustrated by Zhang Guang Wen in The Complete Collection of

Treasures of the Palace Museum, Jadeware (II), no. 228, p. 273, where it notes that cup stands and cups were popular from the

白 Song dynasty onwards and the stands were of a more shallow form in the Ming and Qing dynasties; an eight-lobed similar cup
玉 stand also bearing the Qianlong Yu Yong mark, together with a cup, is illustrated by Xu Xiao Dong in Compendium of Collections

in the Palace Museum, Jade, Vol.10, Qing Dynasty, Gu Gong inventory no. Gu 102934, no. 140, pp. 190/1.

乾 • An imperial spinach jade cup and stand with a four-character mark, Qianlong Yu Yong, ‘For the Use of the Emperor Qianlong’,

隆 in the Qing Court Collection, is also illustrated by Zhang Guang Wen, op. cit no. 225, p. 269; another unmarked spinach

example, from the collection of a European Countess, was included by Marchant in their 75th anniversary exhibition, Post-

Archaic Chinese Jades from Private Collections, 2000, no. 8, pp. 22/3.

• The dragon, long, is the emblem of the Emperor, a zodiac animal and chief of all scaly creatures; it also signifies annual renewal

and benevolence.

160