Late Zhou Dynasty/Early Western Han Dynasty (c. 700 BCE- 8 CE)
Diameter: 9.2 centimeters (3 5/8 inches)
The dark green jade bi with brown calcified areas has beveled band borders along the inner and outer edges, and is decorated with irregular carved and incised hook patterns. An openwork design of a rampant striding feline with rope-twist tail and a widely gaping mouth is carved in the center aperture.
PROVENANCE:
Private Collector-Dealer Macau (pre 1996)
Weisbrod Chinese Art, Ltd., New York, 1996
Private Collection, New York (1996)
Canadian Private Collection (from 2002)
PUBLISHED:
"TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY EXHIBITION of CHINESE WORKS OF ART," March-April, 1996, Weisbrod Chinese Art, Ltd..
A similar feline enclosed in a thinner bi, dated late Zhou in the Willian Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, Kansas City, is illustrated in Chinese Carved Jade by S. Howard Hansford, fig. #42B. Another ivory colored bi with a feline figure carved in almost identical posture, dated to the Warring States Period, is illustrated in Chinese Art, vol. 9 - Jade, pl. no. 131., by Yang Boda Two other examples of jade bi with feline decoration were found in the tomb of the Nanye King: no. 40 an openwork double ring with dragon and phoenix, appears on a number of fine jade pendants dating from the late Eastern Zhou and early Han Dynasties, including the Eastern Zhou "ring" illustrated in Chinese Jade From the Neolithic to the Qing by Jessica Rawson, pl. no. 17:2, and the exterior design of the "bead" pl. 17:17, dated Eastern Zhou.