Museum collections (61)
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61. Gold-threaded crown (with long tailed bird-like jade ornaments) of the Jin Dynasty
Gold and silver wares
Jin Dynasty (1115-1234）
9.5 cm high, 17.1 cm bottom diameter, 5 cm long for each piece of jade
Unearthed from the mausoleum Jin Site, Zhoukoudian Town, Fangshan District, Beijing.
It resembles a bucket, and is made with fine gold wires. Its top is designed like a begonia, its body has a distinct lantern-pattern and its bottom is wrapped with a thick gold wire. This artefact should be the inner lining of a fabric crown. In addition, two pieces of bird-shaped jade ornaments were also unearthed, which were named the jade ornaments with phoenix patterns when they were found. They are white and smooth and exhibit a simple and clear style of craftsmanship. The gold-threaded crown and jade ornaments were unearthed during the excavation and cleansing of the mausoleum Rui of the Jin emperor Agudo (1068—1123) in 2002. This artefact should be the "flower crown" used by the Queen as recorded in The History of Jin and the "Nayan". It is an accessory for a phoenix coronet in ancient China and used in the identification of a queen.
From The History of Jin·24th annals·Closing: "As the phoenix coronet, the flower crown used Sheng ziyi, Qing luobiao, blue silk and gold lining-Hongluo as its inner linings , and was decorated with patterns of nine dragons and four phoenixes. In the front, one dragon held a silk ball, and twelve flowering plants were weaved both at the front and back of the crown as well as a mandarin duck, peacock, Yunhe, Wangmu xianren team, and floating insert petals. At its back there were "Nanyan" with two gold plaques on top. All of the above were decorated with green powder and gold-plated pearls. At its bottom there was a gold circle, and one Hongluo and gold-plated silk ribbon threading through seven gold rings on top and two at the back." "The gold-threaded crown" is only the skeleton of the phoenix coronet and can also be called the hat woven with gold wires. In some literature it is referred to as the "net with gold knots" and "cage with gold knots"，which is sewed inside the silk fabric to form a crown.
The jade pieces with phoenix patterns should be important accessories on this phoenix coronet. They were originally attached to the coronet, and later disintegrated due to the decay of most of its parts. In terms of styling, the jade pieces are very similar to the bird-like pattern, "Lianque", which was popular in the Song and Jin Dynasties. This type of decoration for phoenix coronets is called "Nanyan"（Originally known as an official name in ancient China）in various literature. "Nanyan" was first seen in the “Book·Yuandian”, and its duty was to disseminate the commands of the Emperor. It started to become a kind of decoration associated with the Han Dynasty, which the Tang and Song Dynasties copied. The term literally means to keep an open mind about a wide range of opinions when holding an important position. From the shape of the unearthed crown decoration "Nanyan", one can see several kinds of bird patterns, such as Lianque, swan, Yunhe, Haidongqing and others.
