240 Field Museum of Natural History — Anth., Vol. X. 



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These implements are mentioned as early as in the Shi king (Wei 

 feng, VI; Legge, Vol. I, p. 103; ed. Couvreur, p. 72). 1 According to 

 the Li ki (Nei tse, I, 2; ed. Couvreur, p. 621), every young gentleman 



used to wear a small one on 

 the left side of his belt and a 

 large one on the right side of 

 it, in order to unloose large or 

 small knots. The same pair 

 of implements was worn and 

 used in the same way by 

 married women (Ibid., I, 3). 

 So it seems that the large and 

 small specimen of Wu repre- 

 sent such a pair as sanctioned 

 by the rules of propriety in the 

 Li ki. 



The Ku yii Vu p'u (Ch. 56) 

 gives a series of these imple- 

 ments in the order of its usual 

 paradigma. One is reproduced 

 in Fig. 150, alleged to be 

 adorned with a hydra-head, 

 though it rather seems to be a pig's 

 head. 2 The handle is perforated, and 

 a double ring is attached to it for 

 suspension from the girdle. This 

 object is made a pre-Han. The next 

 with a one -horned hydra head isj 

 alleged to be Han. Then follows, as 

 could not be expected otherwise, the 

 same implement with a phenix-head 

 in which, again, the expression of life 

 is extolled, and which "is a beautiful 

 object of genuine Han people." The 

 series winds up with another phenix- 

 head specimen, "which is slightly 

 different from the preceding one, but 

 is an object left by the early Ts'in 



1 Legge remarks that it belonged to the equipment of grown-up men, and was 

 supposed to indicate their competency for the management of business, however 

 intricate. The youth in the song who is ridiculed had assumed it from vanity. 



2 Here again, the phraseology of pictorial art is used cheng nengju steng "fierce 

 as if alive." A pig's head would be a suitable decoration for this implement, as in 

 the beginning boar's teeth were employed for this purpose (compare p. 203). 



Fig. 147. 



Girdle-Ornament, with Cloud-Pattern, of 



White Jade with Black Stripes. 



