AN INSCRIBED GOLD-PAINTED WHITE JADE 'MALLOW' SNUFF BOTTLE QING DYNASTY, QIANLONG / JIAQING PERIOD

Kaynes-Klitz Collection.
Sotheby's Hong Kong, 16th November 1989, lot 143.

Robert Kleiner, Boda Yang, and Clarence F. Shangraw, Chinese Snuff Bottles: A Miniature Art from the Collection of George and Mary Bloch, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong, 1994, cat. no. 26.
National Museum of Singapore, Singapore, 1994-1995.

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. 107.

Some irregularity to the outer lip, possibly from the smoothing out of minor chips? Natural flaws seen in the material on one side, not cracks.
"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."

After 1760 there were eight imperial workshops for the production of jade, so the fact that a jade bottle was imperial during the later Qianlong period does not necessarily mean that it was made at the palace workshops. There is, however, some indication that at least some of this particular group were probably made at court. Many of them, for instance, are made from flawed or otherwise undistinguished material, which is typical of palace usage (see discussion under Sale 6, lot 171).

The Qianlong emperor is known to have had the palace workers inscribe large numbers of works of art. One of the reasons for thinking that many of these bottles inscribed with imperial poems are later has been the undistinguished quality of the calligraphy. A group of bottles in chalcedony (Moss, Graham, and Tsang 1993, nos. 164–166), glass (nos. 349–350), and enamelled glass of the Guyuexuan group (nos. 192–204), all of which are imperial and attributable to the palace workshops, also present a marked decline in artistic quality from the height of the palace workshops production of the first half of the Qianlong reign. When these are incised with poems, as the chalcedony and glass examples frequently are, the quality of the calligraphy is often far inferior to the standard for the earlier part of the reign. Both the material of the nephrite flower-and-poem group represented by this bottle and the sometimes less-accomplished calligraphy are, in the light of further research, exactly what one would expect of the last third of the reign and the palace workshops.

The workmanshipqualifies it as one of the better examples of the group. The form is elegant, the incising of the clerical-script calligraphy unusually good for a bottle obviously made as an imperial series late in the reign.  

For others of the group, see the commentary in Treasury 1.

This particular example is entitled ‘Mallow’[revisit], and the poetic inscription reads as follows:

不發全枝不放花，一叢淺碧出犬牙。根圍清影高成樹，葉捲愁心孕做花。

If any flowers open, it must be the whole branch that booms;
And the entire thicket of pale emerald puts forth canine teeth.
Around the roots, unsullied shade—when tall, it becomes a tree.
The leaves curl around their melancholy hearts, pregnant with embroidered flowers.

One property of the mallow, it seems, is that all the flowers open at once. Their long, pale petals are the shape of the canines of dogs (the imagery is not original, odd though it may seem). The bush casts a pleasant shade and can grow tall enough for one to relax under it as one would under a tree.