A Handful of Jade Rosettes

These  whimsical little jade rosettes also called yu-hua or jade flowers, date  from  late Qing (19th to about early 20th century)



Antique yu-hua

 

Although the rosettes are made from thin and small pieces of jade they are well shaped with attention to detail. The 12 flower blossoms are carved as rosettes with 5 petals radiating from a raised centre which incorporates  a hole. As all the pieces have only one central perforation I suspect these are likely to be hairpin components rather than buttons. 

 

likely to be hairpin components

 

Here's a circular arrangement  of 8 flowers see picture below

 

 

Circular arrangement of 8 rosettes 



 Four of the jade flowers have rounded concave petals  which have been painstakingly carved to give a scoop or tea spoon like appearance.

 

 

each petal resembles a scoop



  The largest yu-hua measures 1.4cm and the smallest 0.9cm

 

 

Largest and smallest of the floweres

 

There are 5 delicate protrusions at the petal's edge of the next flower which measures all of 1.3 cm

 

  

Spiked at the edge with delicate protrusions

 

It's a delight to hold these century old, tender jade blossoms in the palm of my hand.

 

A handful of jade flowers









I LOVE COLLECTING.....

.....Jade flowers....

The jade flowers I show in this post date from the Ming-Qing period(1368-1912 )  Carved in rosette or elongated shapes they were mostly used as hairpins, hair ornaments or formed parts of larger headgear. The smaller flowers shown in picture 4 could also have been used as buttons.

in rosette shapes pic 1

rosette shape  pic 2

rosette shape pic 3

rosette shape pic 4

elongated shapes pic 1

Asphyxiated with Lust....

When I chanced upon these jade flowers in a shop on my last visit to China I was almost asphyxiated with Lust (but not of the Lee Ang kind) and throwing Caution (he! he!)to the winds I just had to own them. Luckily they were still within my modest budget otherwise like Lee Ang's heroine I might have to stake my life on them !!

The jade blossoms are either round or elongated in shape and except for the centre flower, all are carved in multi layers. Made from nephrite they date from Ming to Qing times and the shapes and patterns are well documented in Cheng Te Kun's paper "Jade flowers and floral patterns in Chinese decorative art". These exquisite ornaments "full of subtle charm and beauty" were used to adorn m'ladies hair or bodice. The black one is very rare, I haven't even seen it in a collectors' book, thats how rare it is !

Jade Flowers or Yu Hua

The white nephrite jade flowers  I show today are among my favourites and hail from Shanxi Province China. Because of their rather large size I conjecture that they may have been used as hair accessories rather than as buttons and date from about the Ming to Qing period. Some gorgeous examples of antique hairpins may be seen in the tv series Story of Yanxi  Palace set in the era of the emperor Qianlong. But my flowers are a bit more modest 😇

The first flower  has six petals and a central corona and one pierced hole

6 petal rosette with central corona

The next flower has more elaborately decorated petals and a double hole in the centre. 

Petals are elaborate

Next to be shown is a multi  scalloped mutton white piece with double holes on the reverse.

Mutton white jade flower

Rounding up are 6 smaller jade flowers in various shapes and designs. All are from Ming-Qing dynasty.

Smaller jade flowers