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- storage at the palace, an imperial decree was issued in the first year of his reign to temporarily stop the annual tribute of jade coming from Yarkand and Khotan to Bei�jing. However, while this was only meant to be a temporary measure, the annual tribute of jade was never to be revived from this time onwards until the fall of the Qing dynasty in 1911.
From various records, we know that the jade pieces carved during Daoguang�s reign were very few and mainly consisted of jewellery. Of the jade carving centres, only Suzhou continued to receive a few special commissions from the palace.
Daoguang tried to suppress the opium trade, which was damaging his nation�s economy, and as a result the Anglo-Chinese war or Opium War of 1839-42 broke out. The war was lost and huge indemnities had to be paid to the British. When Daoguang s son, Xian Feng, came to power in 1850, he inherited a crumbling em�pire and a depleted treasury. In 1851 a major peasant rebellion, known as the Tai- ping Revolution, broke out in south China. It would last thirteen years, devastate more than six hundred cities and cause more than twenty million deaths. In this weakened condition, China found herself once more at war with the Europeans, which culminated in the victorious British and French troops looting the emperor�s summer palace (Yuanming Yuan) of many of its priceless artifacts, including exquisite jade pieces, which eventually found their way into private and museum collections in the West.
Phase IV 1862-1911
For most of Phase IV (1862-1911), China was ruled by the Empress Dowager Cixi29 and her eunuchs. The emperors, Tongzhi (1862-1873) and Guangxu (1874-1908), were mere puppets during most of their reigns.
A major Mohammedan rebellion broke out in Chinese Turkestan and lasted from 1862 until 1877. In 1867 a rebel named Yakub Beg emerged as conqueror and ruler over Yarkand and Kashgar, which included the jade region. As a result, the jade trade with China was halted. A Chinese force succeeded in recovering the territory in 1877, but the jade trade would never be fully revived owing to the lack of interest and to the exploitation of alternative sources of jade such as Burma (which was discussed above) and Siberia.
The purchase of Siberian jade by the Chinese may have begun in the second half of the nineteenth century as a result of the Mohammedan rebellion, which closed off supplies from Khotan and Yarkand. Siberian jade is a fine nephrite, light to medium green in colour, and distinguished by the presence of small black spots or flecks (graphite) inherent in the material. It is usually known as bocai vu (spin�ach jade).
The availability of jade material in China during the second half of the nineteenth century appears to have been quite scarce and very expensive. The palace even had difficulty in purchasing good quality jade. In the meantime, the private work�shops began to fare better.30
The downfall of the Qing dynasty in 1911 meant the removal of the imperial pa�tronage of jade, but this loss was counter-balanced to some extent by the growth of private jade workshops. The increased trade with America and Europe in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century stimulated the private sector to continue the production of jade carvings.
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