Beneath the Pines

1780-1880
Height: 7.8 cm
Mouth/lip: .6/1.75 cm
Stopper: coral; gilt-bronze collar

Provenance:
Vanessa F. Holden Collection, New York, 1997.
Ruth and Carl Barron Collection, Belmont, Massachusetts,
no. 2543.
Christie’s, New York, 13 September 2017, lot 322
Hugh Moss (HK) Ltd.

 

Translucent spinach-green nephrite; with a concave lip and foot; engraved on one main side in regular script with the well-known poem by Jia Dao (AD 799-843) Seeking but not finding the Master, the script filled with gold pigment.

The inscription reads:

Chinese inscription:
松下問童子
言師採藥去
只在此山中
雲深不知處

English translation:
Beneath the pines I asked a child,
He said the master had gone to gather herbs.
He’s surely still within these mountains,
But in the deep clouds, no one knows where.

Enquire
Alexander Whittaker