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- illustrations of the famous Kaogu Tu (an illustrated catalogue of antiquities com�piled in 1092 during the Song dynasty), and then send the design with a piece of jade to Suzhou to be worked on.13
As we can see from the above brief survey of Phase I, there was a great interest in jade carving by the court, even though there was a limited supply of jade mate�rial coming from the main sources of Khotan and Yarkand, which were occupied by unruly tribes. Any jade that did come from there was extremely costly and came at irregular intervals. However, the problem of a jade source was soon to be re�solved, ushering in Phase II of the imperial jade industry of Qing China in 1760.
Phase II 1760-1812
It was during this phase that the jade craft in China attained its greatest glory and reached the high-water mark of technical perfection.
Prior to the founding of the Qing dynasty in 1644, China�s traditional source of �true jade�� or nephrite was located in the region of Khotan and Yarkand in the western part of the Tarim Basin. The jade transport route, which started some
3,000 kilometres west of Beijing, was a long, arduous and hazardous trip through the desert by camel train. The amount of jade coming from there was irregular, due to unsettled political conditions prevailing along the route.
During the first part of the Qing dynasty, the jade region was not under China�s jurisdiction. Sometime during Kangxi�s reign, the area was overrun from the north by the Sungars or Kalmuks, a western Mongolian people. Chaos and tribal wars existed in the area well into the reign of Qianlong. By 1750 there was a full scale struggle for the Sungar throne. In 1754 an unsuccessful claimant named Amur- sana was forced to flee into China with a large part of his tribe, the Khoits, where they declared their allegiance to Qianlong. Qianlong seized this opportunity to settle once and for all the Sungarian problem, which had plagued the frontiers of China for some sixty years. He also may have had ulterior motives for this action, such as wanting to control this jade rich area for his own personal supply of the jade-stone.
Qianlong despatched a large force, in which Amursana was given a command to attack and capture Hi, the Sungar capital. The expedition was successful and Amursana was restored as Khan of the Khoits, and his tribe was given back their former homeland. However, as soon as the conquering forces withdrew, Amur�sana began making plans to personally rule the entire area. This rebellious attitude angered Qianlong who immediately sent troops to reoccupy the Ili area. Amursana fled, then resurfaced to direct renewed resistance and was nearly successful in annihilating the emperor�s army. The Manchu general, Zhao Hui, managed to es�cape and returned with a stronger force in 1757. This time, he completely routed the rebels, slaughtering them ruthlessly.
While Zhao Hui was battling Amursana, an envoy and his escort, who had been despatched by the emperor to the Moslims in eastern Turkestan, were murdered by the Khoja of Yarkand. Previously, the Khoja and his brother had been captives in Ili and were only set free in 1755 when Qianlong�s army entered Ili. Hence, this rebellious act by the Moslims was much resented and Zhao Hui was instructed to suppress the revolt. This he accomplished, but only after fierce fighting did he
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