A TURQUOISE MATRIX PEBBLE SNUFF BOTTLE, 1730-1880

China. The pebble well hollowed, of elongated irregular form tapering towards the mouth. The opaque stone is of a pale turquoise color with brighter areas and black striations.

Provenance: An old private collection in San Francisco, United States, assembled in the 1950s and 1960s, thence by descent to the collector’s wife and subsequently to their grandson Tony Bernstein, a doctor and collector of Chinese snuff bottles in Canada. The Cloud Contemplation Studio Collection, United States, acquired from the above.
Condition: Very good condition with minor wear, a small chip to the mouth and to the coral stopper, and oxidation to the stone.

Stopper: Coral, carved spoon
Weight: 67.3 g (excl. stand)
Dimensions: Height 64 mm, Diameter mouth 5 mm

With an associated wood stand. (2)

Turquoise is a crypto-crystalline aggregate with crystals so fine that the stone is considered practically amorphous. Although the composition varies, it is a hydrous copper aluminum phosphate with some iron. Its hardness on the Mohs scale is slightly less than 6, allowing it to be scratched with firm pressure and a good steel point, although in the snuff-bottle world turquoise is unlike any other material and is never convincingly imitated by anything else, so a test is never necessary.

The stone occurs mainly in veins but can be found in botryoidal form, i.e. pebble-form resembling a cluster of grapes. It is found in a number of places around the world, including Persia, the Sinai Peninsula and Russia. It appears to have been mined in Tibet, where it is one of the most valued stones in the culture, although because of its value the exact whereabouts of the mines has long been shrouded in mystery. Marco Polo spoke of the existence of turquoise in what he called Caindu, which has been identified as modern-day Sichuan province, then largely inhabited by Tibetan tribes, so it is possible that the Tibetans simply used the stone there and gave the impression it was mined locally. It was mined in China, in Zhushan County, Yunxi County, and Yun County in Hubei province, but this is documented only for the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

In Xinjiang, old exhausted turquoise mines still exist in Hami, which was the first Turkic oasis to ask to be a protectorate of the Qing (in 1697). Until the war with the Zunghars, trade between Hami and Beijing flourished, and after the extermination of the Zunghars in 1759, Hami was one of the areas of the vanquished empire in which the Qing were able to have a significant military and civilian presence (which was not the case in the nephrite-producing areas about 1800 km further west). Whether turquoise was part of the tribute that would have resumed is unknown. In any case, imports by sea must have been significant.

Most turquoise snuff bottles are of a distinctly green color that is attributable to the absorption of oils from the hand with much use. To the Qing Chinese, the stone was known as lüsongshi ('green pine stone'), whether green or blue, suggesting that green was the more common color. The Tibetan and Chinese turquoise was found originally both as green and blue, and much of what was used in the snuff-bottle world would have started life as green material.

Auction result comparison:
Type: Closely related
Auction: Bonhams Hong Kong, 28 November 2011, lot 105
Price: HKD 212,500 or approx. EUR 38,500 converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing
Description: A turquoise matrix snuff bottle, 1730-1880
Expert remark: Compare the irregular form, the color of the stone, and the coral stopper. Note the size (4.6 cm).

Auction result comparison:
Type: Closely related
Auction: Bonhams London, 16 May 2024, lot 91
Price: GBP 4,864 or approx. EUR 5,900 adjusted for inflation at the time of writing
Description: A turquoise matrix snuff bottle, 1730-1880
Expert remark: Compare the irregular form and the color of the stone. Note the size (5 cm).