Lot 109. A jade 'tiger' ornament, heng, Eastern Zhou dynasty (770-221 BC); 13 cm, 5 1/8  in. Estimate 150,000 — 200,000 HKD. Lot sold 212,500 HKD. Courtesy Sotheby's.

of flat arc form with each end worked to depict a tiger head, each flat side of the ornament well worked in low relief with scrolling motifs, pierced through at the centre for suspension, the stone of a warm yellowish-beige colour with russet patches.

Provenance: Acquired in the 1970s.

Note: Related carvings include one excavated from Fenghiangshan, Jingzhou, Hubei Province, and held in Jingzhou Museum, published in Zhongguo chutu yuqi quanji / The Complete Collection of Jades Unearthed in China, vol. 10: Hubei, Hunan, Beijing, 2005, p. 132; one of more arched form, in the Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in Gugong bowuyuan cangpin daxi: yuqi bian [Compendium of Collections in the Palace Museum: Jade], vol. 3: Spring and Autumn Period and Warring States Period, Beijing, 2011, pl. 136; and another, excavated from the burial site at Yanggong, Changfeng, Anhui Province, in the Anhui Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, included in Zhongguo chutu yuqi quanji / The Complete Collection of Jades Unearthed in China, vol. 6: Anhui, Beijing, 2005, p. 91.

Sotheby's. Monochrome, Hong Kong, 11 July 2020