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- In ancient China, animal bone, ivory and wood were the main sources for early man�s sculptural art. Neolithic craftsmen produced not only utilitarian tools and arrowheads of bone and ivory but also decorative items. Excavations of Neolithic cultures in Hejiawan in Xixiang, Shaanxi, and Hemuda in Yuyao, Zhejiang and Dawenkou, Ningyang, Shandong province have yielded decorative ivory carvings including butterfly-shaped plaques and combs with fine openwork.
With the founding of the Shang empire (16th-11th century BCE) bone and ivory carvings continued to be important carving materials. Examples of Shang carved bone and ivory items include hairpins, taotie mask ornaments, pendants, handles, arrowheads and vessels. The most important examples come from the excavation of the tomb of the Lady Fu Hao in Anyang, Henan, where some 564-bone carvings and 3 ivory carvings were unearthed. The spectacular ivory carvings include two large beakers and an ewer. The beakers were inlaid with turquoise and the motifs on them resemble the magnificent ritual bronze vessels of the same period.
The Shang Empire was defeated by a pastoral people in the west, who came to be known as the Zhou dynasty (11th - 3rd century BCE). The Zhou had been a linear recipient of Shang tradition and so there was no major or immediate change in culture and art in China. They, too, made artifacts of ivory and probably continued the stylized decorations of the Shang but with deeper and bolder designs. In the Book of Rites of the Zhou dynasty (ZhouliJ, ivoiy was one of the eight kinds of valued materials designated for craftsmen to produce artifacts. The others materials included pearls, jade, stone, wood, metal, leather and feathers. Also mentioned in the Zhouli, is the use of the five ceremonial �/w� carriages, a concept, revived in the Tang, Song and Yuan periods. According to the Zhouli, the emperor�s five lu carriages were adorned with decorations and fittings of either jade, gold, ivory, plain leather or wood.
Quite a few examples of ivory carving from the Zhou period have survived. The most important finds have been recovered from ancient cemeteries at Qufu in Shandong province, where personal ornaments have been found like ivory beads, hairpins, a comb, plaques, finials, back-scratchers, archer�s thumb rings, scabbards and chariot ornaments.
Several ivory specimens dating to the Spring and Autumn Period (770-476 BCE) and the Warring States Period (475-221 BCE) have been unearthed in recent times. Some of them have been stained green or turquoise, possibly in imitation of jade, and some were painted with lacquer. Overall the carving styles on the ivories from this period closely relate to contemporary jade carvings.
During the Han dynasty (206 BCE - 220 CE), ivory was imported from Vietnam and India via Guangzhou from the 3rd century BCE through the whole Han period. Surprisingly however, the raw ivory tusk excavated from the tomb of the King of Nan Yue in Guangzhou is said to be the tusk of an African elephant giving evidence of early trade links. From the same tomb there were ivory carvings of a cup, a seal and chessmen for the liuho game. Other Han period tombs like that of Prince Liu Sheng and Princess Dou Wan at Mancheng, Hebei province (most famous for their jade mortuary suits) have also yielded ivory items such as an incised ladle and bowls. Han ivory carvings of vessels, rulers, hairpins, handles, fittings also continue the tradition of sharing a repertoire of motifs with those that are found on contemporary jade carvings.
Surviving ivory carvings from the Six Dynasties (220-589) are exceptionally rare. We
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