清乾隆 碧玉雕饕餮紋鋪首耳鼻煙壺

Hugh M. Moss Ltd.，香港，1993年

Hugh Moss、Victor Graham 及曾嘉寶，《A Treasury of Chinese Snuff Bottles: The Mary and George Bloch Collection》，卷1，香港，1996年，編號95

It is in good condition.
"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."

Attributions to the palace workshops and the Qianlong period for this bottle are based upon several factors. The choice of material of no inherent value as jade fits in with Qianlong imperial taste, as do the choice of subject matter and the highly interpretive archaism, with the taotie composed of a wide face area made up of archaistic C scrolls and variations thereof. A similar design appears on a yellow nephrite vase and cover in the imperial collection in Beijing (Weng Wange and Yang Boda 1982, p. 264, no. 165). Finally, the strange archaism of the narrow sides, with a taotie made up of two linked kui dragons, is finished with a decorative flourish that is typical of the palace workshops: a ring made of twisted strands reminiscent of the rope motifs that palace carvers borrowed so often from Han-dynasty bronzes.

Like Sale 4, no. 67, this snuff bottle is unusually well hollowed, has a similar archaistic motif, and exhibits extremely high quality in the carving of the surface.

Assuming imperial provenance, this is the only known snuff bottle of this type of pale spinach-green nephrite that can be reasonably attributed to the palace workshops, although there are other plain bottles of similar material that may have been imperial products (see, for instance, Friedman 1990, no. 72, and Hall 1991, no. 33,). Spinach-green nephrite was available long before the snuff-bottle period (a fifteenth-century tankard sold at in our London rooms,  28 April 1994 is of this material) and became common after Yaqub Beg replaced Qing rule in the Tarim Basin in the mid nineteenth century, the nephrite trade dwindled, and traders turned to the Lake Baikal area for a substitute material. It is likely that the darker speckled material that figures so prominently in mid- to late-Qing carvings and became the standard for spinach-green was mined, since it was obviously available in large quantities, was all of similar colour, and is nearly always without any trace of skin used in the carving.