PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE COLLECTION A fine Suzhou Agate BottleSchool of Zhiting, 1750-1850 the dendritic agate carved in graduated levels to depict a continuous rocky landscape with small areas of black-brown inclusions carefully used to depict a figure playing a qin on a rocky ledge above a fawn to one narrow side and a large deer with right leg and head raised to the other narrow side, the larger faces of the plain semi-transparent agate with a cliff and stream beneath a wutong on one face and a baggy-robed figure looking up to the branches of a pine in front of the large deer to the other face, a fairly wide mouth opening and a simple dimple base with flat oval foot ring. 1 7/8in (4.8cm) high, stopper, box 大約 1750-1850 蘇州芝亭流派 瑪瑙巧彫高士山林撫琴鼻烟壺 Provenance: Private Canadian Collection, Ontario, 1990's 出處： 加拿大安大略省私人收藏，1990 年代 For other Suzhou agate bottles, see Christie's, New York, 22 March - 23 March 2012, lot 1601; For further discussion of the designation, School of Zhiting, see Michael C. Hughes, The Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, Chinese Snuff Bottles , Baltimore, 2009, pp.122-126, no's. 95 and 96. The term was coined by Hugh Moss in an attempt to clear up a long-held misconception, that the well-known group of bottles classified as 'Suzhou School' and identified by distinctive features that include 'serrated rockwork' formed by serrated ridges with small indentations, represented Suzhou style as a whole. This assumption is unsustainable, given the substantial number of jade and other hard-stone objects, other than snuff bottles and pendants, produced in Suzhou, which lack this feature entirely. Therefore a new designation, pertinent to bottles alone, School of Zhiting, was coined. The artist Zhiting, whose precise dates are unknown, produced at least six bottles and countless pendants, carved with this distinctive serration and bearing his name. The beautiful town of Suzhou with its canals and gardens attracted painters, calligraphers, poets, musicians and scholars alike. Their pursuits seemed to have appealed to the craftsmen of Suzhou, who depicted them at every opportunity it seems. For a series of Zhiting School Suzhou agate bottles, see G. Tsang and H. Moss, Snuff Bottles of the Ch'ing Dynasty , Hong Kong Museum of Art, 1978, pp. 114-5, nos. 204-7. See, also, a group of Zhiting School small agate bottles from the collection of Denis Low illustrated by R. Kleiner, Treasures from the Sanctum of Enlightened Respect , Singapore, 1999, nos. 190-3.