Footnotes

• Treasury 7, no. 1547
  
  象牙光素鼻煙壺
  
  An ivory snuff bottle
  
  Ivory; very well hollowed, with a flat lip, wide mouth, and flat foot
  1725–1850
  Height: 3.16 cm
  Mouth/lip: 0.58/1.12 cm
  Stopper: ivory; with integral screw-threaded 'cork'; original
  
  Condition: 1-cm long age crack across mouth and down the body of one side; otherwise, excellent condition
  
  Provenance:
  Hugh Moss (HK) Ltd (1992)
  
  Published:
  Treasury 7, no. 1547
  
  There is evidence that screw-threaded ivory bottles were made in the Yongzheng period (as mentioned under Sale 2, lot 120), the vase shape is typical of the court, and this shape of stopper was a standard at the palace workshops throughout the first half of the Qing dynasty and into the nineteenth century. There is nothing about the size, form, hollowing, stopper, or surface patination of this bottle that would preclude such an attribution. The problem, of course, is that there are three of these bottles: see lots 84 and 156 in this Sale. The chances of three early-eighteenth-century snuff bottles of this group surviving from the Yongzheng period, all with their original stoppers intact and all ending up in the same collection, are significantly slim. The patination argues against an early-eighteenth-century attribution, as well. If the bottles were so early, we might expect at least one of them to be more discoloured than the others, for three bottles over so long a period would have surely experienced very different patterns of use. All, however, have a similar degree of natural patination; this patination, moreover, while suggesting considerable age, seems insufficient for three centuries of handling.
  
  The type of stopper, nevertheless, does suggest a northern product, and the similar vase shapes of all three may indicate courtly production. We have left a fairly wide dating range, given these questions. Such matters aside, perhaps the most important observation to make is that these masterpieces of the miniature snuff-bottle arts are faultlessly fashioned and of lovely form.
   
  象牙光素鼻煙壺
  
  象牙；掏膛徹底 ，平唇，寬口，平底
  1725–1850
  高﹕ 3.16 厘米
  口經/唇經： 0.58/1.12 厘米
  蓋： 象牙；與螺紋塞為一體；原件
  
  狀態敘述：因為積年累月，壺口、身發生了1厘米的裂縫；此外，狀況極善
  
  來源﹕
  Hugh Moss (HK) Ltd (1992)
  
  文獻﹕
  Treasury 7, 編號1547
  
  說明﹕
  有螺紋的鼻煙壺參見 第二場拍賣會，拍賣品號 120。論理上，本壺應屬雍正朝 宮廷作坊。但是這場拍賣會一共推出三件類似的煙壺，見拍賣品號84、156。這品種十八世紀的煙壺有三件帶著原件的蓋而最後處於同一個珍藏的可能性簡直是太小了。而雖然色澤古雅，三件都缺乏經過三百年觸摸以後應有的變色。無論如何，三件都是微型鼻煙壺的傑作。
  

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Category: Asian Art / Chinese Works of Art

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