一件刻纹玉饰的辨识

The Identification of a Jade Ornament with Incised Designs

1987年在安徽省含山县凌家滩墓地第四号墓中曾出土一件刻纹玉饰,现收藏于故宫博物院。以往关于这件刻纹玉饰的放置方式及刻纹内容,很少提及。本文率先探讨了这件刻纹玉饰的用途,认定其为梳背饰;在明确了其摆放方式的基础之上经仔细审视,提出这件刻纹玉饰上所琢刻的应是一条单首双身的龙形图案。

In 1987 a jade ornament with incised designs was unearthed from the tomb M4 at the Lingjiatan page 112 to 120. cemetery jn Hanshan county, Anhui province,and this object is now in the collection of the Palace Museum in Beijing. When this object was first published, the design was described as having been ar ranged horizontally, but later scholars interpreted the arrangement of the incised designs as vertical. Given this long-standing disagreement regarding the interpretation of the use of the ornament, the design and object are alternatively described as though indistinctly perceived-either as a 'jade ornament with a motif of a transformed profile of a human face', or as a 'jade decoration bearing a human head motif. This author is of the view that the mode in which the motif on any artefact is arranged cannot be the result of a subjective whim, but should be determined by the function of the object itself. Only once the applica tions of an object are clarified are we able to interpret the design and arrangement of the artifact and reach a fairly accurate conclusion regarding these and related questions. The author begins by examining the function of the decorated jade and concludes that it is the decoration from the ridge of a comb; careful scrutiny on the basis of a clarification of the way in which the decorative motif is arranged reveals the incised design to be a dragon with a single head and double body.