AN INCISED JADE 'OPEN BOOK' SNUFF BOTTLE YUZHI SEAL MARK AND PERIOD OF QIANLONG

Sotheby's Hong Kong, 3rd November 1994, lot 977.

Robert Kleiner, Chinese Snuff Bottles in the Collection of Mary and George Bloch, British Museum, London, 1995, cat. no. 40.
Chinese Snuff Bottles in the Collection of Mary and George Bloch, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, 1997.

Hugh Moss, Victor Graham and Ka Bo Tsang, A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles: The Mary and George Bloch Collection, vol. 1, Hong Kong, 1996, no. 111.
Carol Michaelson, 'The Use of Archaism as a Decorative Motif in Snuff Bottles', Journal of the International Chinese Snuff Bottle Society, Winter 2000, p. 8.

The overall condition is very good, with only some barely perceptible nibbles to the extremities. The characters have generally been well reserved with only some minor losses to the ink. The actual colour is quite close to the catalogue illustration.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

The poem inscribed on this bottle was written to commemorate the subjugation of two aboriginal territories by Agui 阿桂in Sichuan in 1776, which means that the bottle was made no earlier than 1776. The poem refers to Agui’s image being displayed in the portrait gallery for meritorious generals, the Ziguang ge 紫光閣 (the name in the poem is that of a Tang-dynasty hall consecrated to the same purpose); according to Agui’s biography in the draft Qing history that his image was painted there four times, the second time being in recognition of his leadership in the Sichuan campaign. On the twenty-seventh day of the fourth month (13 June 1776), there was a great ceremony in which Agui and his subordinates, all dressed in armour, were received by the emperor; Agui kowtowed nine times before His Majesty; on the following day, they were honoured by a banquet at the Ziguangge (see the Qing Wenxian tongkao 清文獻通考, juan 156). It is almost certain that the poem on this bottle was written about that time to celebrate the occasion. Although it is possible that it was written between 1776 and 1797, when Agui died, or that the bottle was made between 1776 and 1799, when the Qianlong emperor died, the strong likelihood is that the snuff bottle presented here was in existence with its inscription in mid-1776.

The author of the poem is a native of Manchuria named Mengji 夢吉, courtesy name Jianxi 鑒溪 (jinshi 1769). The poem is the fifth of a set of seven under the title Pingding liang Jinchuan dagong gaocheng gongji 平定兩金川大功告成恭紀 (‘Respectfully recorded on the occasion of the great accomplishment of the completion of the subjugation of the two Jinchuan [tribes]’). Hummel 1943, pp. 7-8, provides as part of Agui’s biography a brief history of the costly five-year war against the Jinchuan territories. For the poems and the only background information about Mengji discovered to date, see Tiebao 鐵保 (1752 – 1824), Xichao yasong ji 熙朝雅頌集 (1804; 1992 edition published by Liaoning daxue chubanshe), pp. 1535-1536.

The poem reads:                           

黃屋光臨自九天，將軍颺拜玉階前。芙蓉山隊閒排甲，楊柳新堤緩著鞭。
鼉鼓紀程鼗鼓樂，鐵衣出塞錦衣旋。凌煙圖畫兼題讚，千載榮施播簡編。

When the yellow-canopied imperial cart arrived from the heavens,
The general raised his hands high and prostrated himself before the jade steps.
A mountain [sic] troupe of lotus idly arranges plates of armour;
A new dyke of willows gradually sprouts whips.
Lizard-skin drums mark progress, rattle drums make music;
With clothes of iron he left the border, in brocade robes he returns.
His portrait in the Lingyan Pavilion will have a colophon of praise;
Acts whose glory will last a thousand years will fill the histories.

The first couplet describes the arrival of the emperor at the palace where the general was to be honoured; all other versions of the poem have the general bowing in front of the One Who Is Reverenced to the Utmost (zhizun 至尊), rather than the metonymic ‘jade steps’. (See, for example, the Huang Qing wenying xubian 皇清文穎續編 [1810], juan 85 p. 7b.) More on this below.

The second couplet (as Mengji wrote it) describes the palace garden scene with images of substitution that are suitably martial: the lotus leaves are plates of armour, and the wands of the willows are whips. No extant versions refer to a ‘mountain’ troupe of hibiscus, but rather to a ‘small’ troupe, xiaodui 小隊. In fact, an earlier poem by a Zhu Shi 朱軾 (1665 – 1736) that celebrates a victory in Qinghai includes this line and the next one verbatim (with ‘small troupe’) – as well as the phrase ‘from the heavens’ and the line ‘With iron clothes he left the border, in brocade robes he returns’! It is clear that Mengqi composed by cutting and pasting. (For Zhu Shi’s poem, see the Huang Qing wenying 皇清文穎 [1747], juan 8, p. 7a.)

Qianlong yuzhi mark on the foot of this bottle must mean that the emperor gave the order for the bottle to be made, perhaps to be given to Agui.

Returning to the carver’s substitution of shan 山 for xiao 小 in line 3, it is probably based on a misreading of a mixed-script copy of the poem that the carver was instructed to transfer to the bottle in regular script; the two characters can look very similar if written in draft script. This raises the question of quality control in whatever workshop produced the bottle, but given that the campaign being celebrated was in a mountainous area and that the word furong 芙蓉 can also mean ‘hibiscus’ (which grows on dry land), it is possible the error was overlooked.

The substitution of ‘jade steps’ in line 2 is equally intriguing. Both versions make perfect sense; does this one simply reflect a different version by Mengqi himself? Or was the change made because the emperor felt that it was a bit too much for him to refer to himself as the ‘One Who Is Reverenced to the Utmost’ on a bottle that he commissioned?

Quite apart from the documentary importance of the inscription, the bottle itself is conceptually and technically unsurpassed.

The bottle is shaped as a book folded back upon itself, the edges of the pages overlapping so as to form a rough cylinder containing the bottle. The disposition of the poem on the pages of the book is extremely imaginative, since it gives the impression that the general’s exploits have already entered the written records of the culture, cementing his military prowess for all time.

The bottle is superbly formed, exquisitely detailed, and extraordinarily well hollowed for a form where virtuoso hollowing could hardly have been expected. The spine of the book and the fanned out pages are all convincingly depicted in painstaking detail, and their asymmetry provides a perfect foil for the formal integrity of the bottle they enclose.

The calligraphy is also of a standard higher than many imperially inscribed bottles of the second half of the Qianlong period.