Feb., 1912. Jade. 45 



on Anderson's statement, explained the miniature jade celts as protec- 

 tive amulets. This, however, is a very recent development. I am not 

 aware of the fact that any such minute celts have ever been discovered 

 in a grave; they result from surface finds, and many of them may be 

 just a few centuries old. 1 The wearing of jade celts as personal adorn- 

 ments is not older than the Han period, as shown by two artistic spec- 

 imens in our collection (Plate XXVIII, Figs. 3 and 4) found in Han 

 graves. The first literary allusion to such charm celts occurs in the 

 Po wu chi of the third century a. d. (see p. 64). 



As early as the Shang dynasty (b. c. 1 766-1 122), the axe seems to 

 have been the victorious emblem of the sovereign. In the sacrificial 

 ode Ch'angfa (Legge, Shi king, Vol. II, p. 642) in praise of the house of 

 Shang, the founder of the dynasty T'ang is described as "the martial 

 king displaying his banner, and with reverence grasping his axe, like 

 a blazing fire which no one can repress." 2 The axe was accordingly a 

 sovereign and martial emblem, and the emperors of the Chou dynasty 

 had a pattern of axes embroidered on their robes (called fu, Giles 

 No. 3630). This ornament was the eleventh among the twelve chang 

 embroidered on the imperial state-robe (Legge, Chinese Classics, 

 Vol. Ill, pp. 80-81). 



Embroideries with representations of the axes fu were used on the 

 altar of the God T'ai-i "the Supreme Unity," "the most venerable 

 among the gods," as told in a hymn addressed to him in the "Annals 

 of the Former Han Dynasty" (Chavannes, Se-ma Ts'ien, Vol. Ill, 

 p. 618). 



There was a constellation called "the Axes" which, being bright, 

 foreshadowed the employment of axes, and when in motion, a levy of 

 troops. The axes symbolize the events in the army and refer to the 



1 E. g., in Bishop (Vol. II, p. 208), a ceremonial axe (No. 637) for display on 

 the altar of a Taoist temple is figured and described; it is attributed to the K'ien- 

 lung period (1 736-1 795). Its back is straight, the sides concave, and the edge 

 rounded and convex in outline. The figure of a lion stands on the top of the back, 

 and two winged monsters covered with spiral designs are attached to the sides in 

 d jour carving. 



2 A ditty in the Shi king (Legge, Vol. I, p. 240) reads thus: "In hewing the 

 wood for an axe-handle, how do you proceed? Without another axe it cannot be 

 done. In taking a wife, how do you proceed? Without a go-between it cannot be 

 done." Biot (in Legge's Prolegomena, p. 165) refers to the Pi-pa ki, a drama of 

 the ninth century, in which the go-between presents herself with an axe as the 

 emblem of her mission, and cites upon the subject this passage of the Book of Songs. 

 The commentary does not say, remarks Biot, whether this custom of carrying an 

 axe as an emblem be ancient; the go-between makes even a parade of her learning 

 in explaining to the father of the young lady, whom she has come to ask for, why she 

 carries an axe. In my opinion, this is merely a literary jest of the playwright. It 

 does not follow either from the above passage that the negotiator of a marriage 

 actually carried an axe as emblem ; the making of an axe-handle by means of an axe 

 is simply used jocosely by way of a metaphor, which occurs also in another song 

 (Ibid., p. 157). 



