Lot 1. A white and brown jade reticulated 'Dragon' finial, Yuan dynasty (1279-1368); 4.6 cm, 1 3/4  in. Estimate: 40,000-60,000 HKD. Lot sold 250,000 HKD (31,968 USD). © Sotheby's.

skilfully reticulated as a sinuous dragon, the mythical beast rendered with incised mane and depicted entwined with dense clusters of floral scrolls, the pale celadon stone with brown inclusions.

Provenance: Collection of Hans Öström, Stockholm.
Collection of Emil Hultmark (1872-1943), and thence by descent in the family.

Note: A similar dragon finial, in the Taipei Palace Museum, was included in the Museum’s exhibition Age of the Great Khan. Pluralism in Chinese Art and Culture Under the Mongols, Taipei, 2001, cat. no. IV-7; another in the Palace Museum, Beijing, is illustrated in Compendium of Collections in the Palace Museum. Jade. Ming Dynasty, vol. 6, Beijing, 2011, pl. 110; and a third was excavated from the tomb of Prince Zhuang of Liang and Lady Wei at Zhongxiang, Hubei province, and included in the exhibition Ming. 50 Years that Changed China, British Museum, London, 2015, cat. no. 46. See also a Ming dynasty reticulated finial sold in these rooms 3rd October 2018, lot 3355, and another sold on 1st December 2016, lot 170, from the Muwen Tang Collection.

According to Brian S. McElney in ‘Han to Song Chinese Jades’, Roger Keverne (ed.), Jade, London, 1991, p. 118, ‘The relatively sudden appearance of such open-work [during the Jin-Yuan dynasty] probably resulted from improved techniques for carving jade, which must have been introduced at this time’. For several comparable examples in the British Museum and extensive discussion on these finials see Jessica Rawson, Chinese Jade: From the Neolithic to the Qing, London, 1995, pp. 338-339, no. 25:15.

Sotheby's. Chinese works of art from the Collection of Emil Hultmark, Hong Kong, 29 november 2018